Holding The Cards (19 page)

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"I'd be happy to clean that up for you, Mistress," he said, his gaze latched on its course over her skin.

She swallowed, and her hands trembled at his soft tone, the need in his face. "Just the leg."

She drew in an unsteady breath as his lips caught the bead just above the back of her knee. His hand balanced him on her thigh, his light touch eliciting a scream from her body for more, a scream that got more insistent as his firm lips traveled upward, following the bead's path. He took his time, sucking her dew off her heated flesh with the leisure thoroughness of a lion cleaning his mate's pelt.

When he reached the upper part of her thigh, his tongue carefully licking just below her crotch, the curve of his skull brushed across her mound with every stroke. Lauren's body quivered despite her attempt at control. A soft whimper came from her lips.

His fingers tightened on her knee, even as his raised gaze communicated understanding. He comprehended, as she did, the desperate need that lay beneath the surface of this game. That was the niggling worry that kept her stepping so carefully. They had no way of knowing if they were lost souls drawn together by desolation or destiny. She was terrified of the answer, but the only way to find out was to let go of fear and take the risk.

He shifted his angle. Just a graze of teeth and lips over her quivering clit, his hands sliding up both her thighs. He was showing her what pleasure could be had, the little boy only being a little bit bad…

She bit down on a groan and slid her hand down over his hair as his tongue gave her a stronger, more insistent lick through the fabric, the friction rubbing her aroused pussy. Her fingers dug in, held him still.

He gazed up at her, playfulness warring with dangerous mutiny in his stormy eyes.

If she had only seen desire there, she might have given in at this moment. But she saw the fear. He was scared shitless, just like she was, and he thought he could use her body's needs to shove her away from the shadows that lurked within him.

At heart, people were animals, burrowing in holes with their hurts, never realizing they would die in those holes if they did not summon the courage to drag themselves out and let themselves be healed. A rueful smile curled her lip. Physician, heal thyself.

"Back off," she murmured, shifting the smile into an amused disinterest as he obeyed with a reluctance that was echoed in every raging cell of her body.

Lauren eased off the horse. Her knees were trembling. Josh reached up from his kneeling position, steadied her. His hand slid down her waist, over her hip, to her thigh, lingering. He leaned forward and pressed a kiss there. His expression was reverent, passionate, eager, fierce, and she had to stifle a groan of need. Did a Dom just know instinctively when the time was right? She hoped so; otherwise she was going to kill them both.

"Stay there, on your knees," she ordered, and she put some space between them, gathering her composure. She was too good a Mistress to give away her state of mind, however, so her walk around the room to get a breather was a calculated saunter. She lingered by each sexual device, examined them, ran her hands over soft cuffs, the cold metal of steel bars, the polished wood of a bench. Marcus was watching her, too, his face impassive, but she needed no clues from him at the moment and did not look in his direction.

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It was a few moments before her body settled enough that she really began to see what was before her, and then she began watching Josh out of the corner of her eye. His gaze was following her, but she noted the tension in those fine shoulders grew more pronounced whenever she lingered at any type of restraint system, anything that would leave the sub helpless to defense against the Dom. A smile curved her lips.

Of course. She stopped.

"I want you here," she said.

It was the dominant piece in the room, a device like a St. Andrew's cross, only modified into an H

design. The shape allowed the captor full front and back access to the captive, with the exception of a couple wide cross pieces that could be adjusted up or down, wherever the captor chose to position them. She turned to face the kneeling man, and her heart broke a little as she saw the uncertainty, the desperation and fear, in his eyes.

"Will you trust me, Josh?" she said softly. "Trust me to know when to be kind, and when to be not so kind?"

Would he let her hold the cards until the game was over?

She was upping the stakes, and they all knew it. She had crossed the line that was safe for both of their hearts. She was going to challenge him, push him, see how far he would submit to her. She couldn't look to Marcus for approval or disapproval this time. It was between the two of them.

"I trust you," he said at last, his eyes on the ground, as if he was not brave enough to agree while looking at her. His voice was hoarse. "I don't know why. I hardly know you. But I do. Completely."

Then, as if he had given himself a mental slap for cowardice, he jerked his head up, and looked at her.

"I will serve my Mistress's pleasure," he said.

Lauren swallowed a fist size lump of jagged glass, almost crying out at the pain, but an amazing thing happened to it once it cleared her throat. It lodged in her heart, where it was warmed by the simple sincerity in his eyes, the devotion in his voice, and every line of his body. The jagged edges melted, and she felt a complete, tender fulfillment. Someone who trusted her, believed in her, willingly gave himself to her to be cherished and who would cherish her in return. It was the Whole she had wanted to give to Jonathan, but the foundation for it had never been there. The rest of it was always hard work, but the underlying current to give it a chance had to be there. Josh and she had had it instantly. Now they just had to wade through the baggage to keep from fucking it up.

"Then you should cast your eyes down," she reproved, and came forward. She kissed him on the top of his bowed head, nuzzling his hair. His fingers clutched her calves for a moment, hard.

She clucked at him, correcting him, and he removed his hands, bracing them into tense fists on the floor on either side of her feet. "You need to remember manners," she reminded him, and turned, though her heart had tilted at the sheer desperation of his grasp.

"And what is the lady's wish, now that she has her slave's compliance?" Marcus arched a brow at her, rising from his chair.

Lauren paused, and glanced back at Josh, taking him in from head to toe. The bare back, the tight ass, the pink undersides of his bare feet.

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"Put him there," she nodded to the St. Andrew's Cross. "I want him spread and cuffed, face forward.

Strip him of all his clothes, oill him down." Her gaze watched the muscles knot across his tanned shoulders, in response to her silky words.

"I really, really like her," Marcus sighed happily.

"Turn around on your knees, Josh. Raise your eyes, and look at me," she said.

He did, and he did not look as pleased as Marcus sounded. Lauren turned, walked toward the dressing room. She undid her swimsuit, letting it fall to the floor, and then turned, a Betty Gable pose, just giving him a hint of profile.

"Will you obey me, Josh?" she asked. "All you have to do…” she raised a hand, cupped her breast and stroked its curve idly. "Is say…no."

His nostrils flared, as if he caught the scent of her from across the room. "I'll obey," he managed roughly.

"But I'd rather throw you to the floor, spread your legs wide and fuck you until you lose consciousness."

She nodded, keeping her expression unruffled, though need tightened like a fist in her gut at the dark intent in those gray eyes. "Maybe you'll get that chance…if you're good." She smiled. "Or maybe, if you're bad."

She surprised a grin out of him. It eased the tension in his shoulders, and that reassured her. The stress would come back, she knew, as soon as Marcus started following her instructions. She sensed something dangerous down in this dungeon. The setting was almost too perfect; too open to pushing past hard limits, and she hardly knew his soft ones.

She put her hand on the dressing room door, then stopped, turned back. "Marcus?"

Josh had just shed the shorts, and he was naked, vulnerable and beautiful, his back to her. She wanted to go kiss the soft skin between his shoulder blades, run her hand over the small of his back, smack that taut buttock. All in good time. Down, girl.

"Yes, dear lady?" From Marcus's amused expression, Lauren decided he was repeating the question.

"I want him blindfolded. A full head mask, if they've got one. Ears, nose and mouth open."

She closed the door again on his nod, ignoring the alarm in Josh's face.

"Keep your eye on the ball, girl," she told herself, repeated it in her mind, tried not to let the pain and worry in those beautiful gray eyes unbalance her, deflect her from her intent.

Marcus had told her the purpose of the two rooms, how one was marked for Mrs. Salerno and one for Mr. Salerno, but she had not gone into either costume room when she first came into the dungeon. Now her jaw dropped in shock and sheer admiration for the quantity of choices. There was everything from queen to jungle girl, gun moll to waitress. She wondered if the Salernos ever left it to chance, each going
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into their respective costume room to choose, emerging to the fun of coming up with scenarios that meshed unlikely pairings such as Queen with rock star, or waitress with overseer.

She turned and surveyed with quiet delight a wall of toys, including a selection of whips, supple and gleaming with regular waxing. She wondered if that was one of Josh's jobs; he and Marcus had seemed to know where the room was well enough. The variety of mechanisms, from the carousel horse to the automated suspension system, would certainly require regular repair and maintenance to ensure the machinery ran smoothly.

She picked out a handmade braided whip, with an extended handle to increase control and accuracy.

Silver rings worked into the seven-foot length gave it a liquid movement when she rolled it out. The balance was near to perfect for her, suggesting the whip had been custom made for Mrs. Salerno. A popper of a half dozen thin strips had been tied into the eyeloop at the end, and though the strips were soft to the touch, they were thin and resilient enough to deliver quite a sting. She ran her hands over the instrument and imagined Josh's long fingered hands waxing the plaited surface, rubbing, his brow creased in concentration, his soft hair falling over his forehead and along the curve of his neck, the smooth muscle in his biceps rolling with his movements.

She was stroking the whip as if she was stroking him, and she stopped herself, surprised at the erratic tempo of her pulse, the pounding of her heart. How could he have affected her like this so quickly? But she knew. She knew when she saw his statue in the courtyard.

She experimented with a few flicks, getting used to the feel. She had told Marcus and Josh that once D/s was in the blood, it was hard to shake. When she had been recovering from Jonathan's cruelty, sure that she needed to break her unhealthy addiction to the lifestyle, she had decided to invest in a nicotine patch, so to speak. She had taken bullwhip lessons from an expert who worked at one of the clubs. Her grandmother had always said that to get out of funk, try something different. Lauren was sure her grandmother never imagined the advice applying to her daughter's colorful sex life.

Under John's tutelage, she had gotten quite skillful with the bullwhip. They practiced at his home; in a barn he had converted into a playroom, though it was not so elaborate as the Salerno's. One evening, a young man showed up, one of the subs who waited tables at the club. He was also a staff "Slave" that could be rented by the hour by Doms, if the staffperson felt comfortable with it. He made a good pretense of having just dropped by John's for a beer, but from the stillness in his eyes, and the shortness of her own breath when she looked at him, they had all known it was a lie. John talked her into taking a passing "test", practicing on a live subject. The boy had smiled at her as John spreadeagled and cuffed him.

She had the boy sweating and painfully aroused after ten minutes, with tiny red marks striping his raised arms, straining buttocks, and quivering inner thighs. She had celebrated her graduation with a cold shower, a long session with the detachable multi-setting head, and a hard cry.

The idea of Josh belonging to her, submitting to her so that she could bring him to peak after peak of pleasure, could hear him groan her name, beg for release and then come back for more…she trembled to think of it, and her palms were not the only part of her body with moist crevices at the thought. A man who would submit to her desires as willingly as Josh was a heady aphrodisiac.

That was just part of it, though. The emotions she felt for him were not just interwoven with her physical desires. The physical desire was like a clutched fist of need, trying to grasp something that would last beyond the last vibration of the orgasm. She not only wanted to play with the lion; she wanted to take him home and keep him.

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Enough. She shook herself out of pointless reflection. There were other toys on the wall to examine, and she had to get dressed. There was a fine line between building his anticipation and making him wait so long he fell asleep.

Chuckling at herself, she turned to the racks of clothes.

* * * * *

She found, however, that her less omnipotent self had to use the support of the door jam for a moment or two, as she reminded herself to breathe.

It had taken her a half-hour at the makeup vanity to achieve the effect she wanted for herself, and Marcus had made good use of the time. She was hard put not to moan in sheer tortured delight at what lay before her, a piece of artwork better than anything the Salernos had paid five figures to own.

Marcus had cuffed Josh on the St. Andrew's Cross, strapping three lines of restraints on each limb to severely inhibit movement. Straps bound Josh at the ankle, calf and mid thigh for each leg, and the wrist, elbow and bicep for the arms. Another strap was around his throat, another at his forehead, holding his head immobilized against one of the adjustable cross pieces. Marcus had even added a strap at Josh's waist that threaded through another cross bar, moved to his lower back for support. The result was that he could move very little, if at all. He was totally, magnificently, at her mercy, his body gleaming with the light sheen of sandalwood oill Marcus had slicked onto every expanse of skin.

The head mask was on, as she had ordered, covering all that beautiful hair and his eyes. His mouth was visible and open, nervous tongue darting out repeatedly to wet dry lips. His nostrils were flared, his body tense, straining with the remaining senses to detect her return.

He was afraid, that was obvious, but overwhelmingly aroused. It was the ultimate state of vulnerability, when a Dom could bring pleasure and joy, or prey upon the sub's darkest emotions and fear.

"Jesus Christ, you are fucking beautiful."

It was a reflection of her own thoughts, but after Lauren blinked and focused on something other than Josh, she saw Marcus was talking about her. She had hardly noticed him once she saw Josh, but now she registered that he had had time to get into the spirit of things himself. He had paid a visit to the costume room and changed into the flowing white and gold robe of a pharaoh, open to show a tanned bare chest and loose silken white pants beneath, sheer enough to suggest the dark smudge of his privates and pubic hair. His feet were bare. If she didn't know his proclivities were not for her sex, and if her mind and heart were not so engaged to the man to his left, her mouth would water. As it was, he made an impact on her blood, which was already moving back from simmer into boil.

He smiled, and it was slow, appreciative and feral, one alpha acknowledging the power of another. "You could make a man think about changing teams for a night or two, love."

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She laughed, a soft purr of sound, and strolled out, sauntered as if Josh could see her, let him imagine by her cadence the generous swing of her hips, the quiver of her breasts that resulted from the reverberation of her spiked heels with the stone. The ankle wrap she had tightened and left on beneath the supple covering of the boot was holding up well, as long as she kept her movements slow and deliberate.

She sidled up to Josh, one casual step at a time, until she was close enough for him to smell the exotic oils she had rubbed on herself. She drifted a finger along the slippery line of his neck, down his collar bone. "Are you nervous, Josh?"

A quick jerk of his head.

"But not scared of me, I hope." Her voice was soft, sensual, teasing, but with an undercurrent of seriousness. It was so easy to do this, so easy to do this with him.

The faint musk odor of his oill teased her senses and she indulged, her eyes roaming appreciatively over the slick muscles and flanks. The lighting in the room had been adjusted so the recessed spotlights were positioned to reflect off of the glistening thighs. Lauren swallowed at the sight of his stiff cock, so aroused the glans brushed his belly. It had not been oiled, cloaked in only its natural satin-over-steel smoothness, a bit of fluid leaking from the tip glossing the top.

"No, Mistress." It was just above a whisper. He
was
scared, but she knew by instinct it was his own soul, and the shadows that were rising from it, that were frightening him. A Dom had to bring the nightmares out, let them loose, so there would be nothing between Master and sub but trust, and pleasure, mutual devotion.

The thought brought an ache to her throat and tears to her eyes, and she felt a moment of true sadness.

This time, there was no familiar sour taste of bitterness, or the taste of Jonathan. There was only Josh, and the pain and desire she felt for him.

She moved closer to Josh, and very gently stroked her knuckles across his lips, framed by the mask. It was a reassuring touch, though her proximity brushed her thighs against his arousal and made them both quiver.

"You know what I think about when I'm scared, Josh?"

He shook his head, then remembered. "Butterflies, Mistress."

She smiled. "You are so good. Just remember that. Okay?"

He swallowed. He was doing that a lot, and she found the nervousness charming, and arousing. She laid a soft kiss on his lips, which trembled under hers with his uncertainty and passion, and she murmured against them. "I'm here, Josh, and I'm going to make it all right. You're going to give me everything, and I'm going to heal it, and put it back inside you. Okay?"

She had no doubt of it, certain of her power, her role, dressed the part, in the right surroundings.

He shook his head, too overcome to speak, and she stepped back from him. "Are you doubting me, Josh?" She allowed enough ice to creep into her tone to make sure he felt the chill as solidly as a touch from her hand. One slight flick, and the whip end coiled around his ankle, just a whispering touch, then it was gone again. He jerked, his breath catching in his throat.

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"You will hold nothing back from me, Josh. Try all you want, but you know who is Mistress here.

Marcus," she tilted her head toward the other man. He was watching them both, a morass of things she could not read moving behind his expressive eyes.

"Josh is going to find it very difficult to control himself," she warned. "I don't want to have to be too cruel to him. Please put this on him, and make it as tight as he can stand it."

She lifted her other hand, which held a web of straps, and silver chain. Marcus's eyes flickered to it and then back up to her face. She waited. Would he refuse? Josh was his friend, and he had already warned her he would brook no unreasonable measures against his friend. Could he read her intentions?

Lauren took a step, laid the device in his palm and closed his fingers over it, then her hand over his, tightening her grip.
It's okay
, she mouthed.

Whatever he saw in her eyes satisfied him, for he nodded, curled his fingers briefly over hers, and took the device from her hand.

Lauren stepped back so she got a good view of her subject again. "Marcus is going to put a cock harness on you, Josh," she said. "I want to see your cock on display, and I want you to stay hard for me."

"I suspect," his voice was thick, "I could oblige you in that, regardless, Mistress."

She laughed, a light caressing sound that floated close then drifted away. "But it's like a favored piece of artwork, Josh. I want it framed, mounted for my pleasure."

Marcus dropped to one knee and coated his hands with the oill from the bottles he had used to slick Josh down earlier. His hand closed, with gentle admiration, over Josh's erection. Josh jumped, though he was unable to move his hips more than an inch because of the straps holding his thighs apart and his waist immobile. Marcus oiled the shaft as Josh's breath clogged in his throat, his color rising to his exposed jaw line.

"It feels different, having a man handle you, doesn't it?" Lauren asked. She circled to his right, distracting him from Marcus by making him search for her with his hearing and his nose. "A strong touch. His hand is sure of what will pleasure you, in a way a woman can learn but will never truly feel, or understand. She just enjoys when she gets it right and sees your body quiver under her palm, or feels your cock jump under the moist flick of her tongue, inside the deep recesses of her mouth, as she takes you in, sucking, drawing out your response."

Marcus chuckled as Josh groaned and attempted to thrust against his hand, then jerked in shame. Red color rose along his exposed neck.

"My dear," Marcus said, "you are supposed to soothe the beast until you get the cage on him, not tease him into a rage while he's still unfettered."

She laughed, a delighted sound. "My apologies, Marcus." But her grin was unrepentant.

"Laur — Mistress —" Josh's distress was palpable and she shifted gears, made her voice softer. She came closer to him.