At Her Will (Mistresses of the Board Room #5)

Chapter 10

CHAPTER TEN

“ A re you watching this?” Cyn murmured. She knew the question was merely a request for input, because Ros had followed Vera and Rev’s progress through the club as closely as she had. Vera was usually a private session kind of Mistress, but she’d chosen to do a low-key scene with him in a spot with a clear view to their booth. “He’s completely new to it, physically. But she’s right. Mentally, he’s been there a while.”

“Most members here know that feeling,” Ros responded. “I haven’t seen her get attached this quickly. Ever.”

“The fit’s there. Hard to miss.”

Ros glanced at Lawrence, leaning against the side of the booth. Her beloved submissive would see Vera and Rev’s chemistry from a different angle. Because Rev was new to this, it could cause unexpected responses, so Lawrence would pay particular attention to how Rev was doing.

Vera’s simple test of his responses had dazed him, a light-handed subspace, the knee-weakening kind. He didn’t seem embarrassed by it. Vera was right; there was evidence of alpha and beta markers in him.

“Might be time to do a deeper dive on this one, boss,” Cyn said.

“Vera is our HR rep. You think she hasn’t already?”

Cyn shook her head. “If it was about one of us, she’d dive in like a CIA analyst. If it’s for her, she’s going to do the ‘respect his privacy’ blah blah bullshit.”

She looked at Lawrence. “It’s not an obvious fit to me. Blue collar, low skilled job, not well-educated. Vera’s not the slumming-for-a-nice-piece-of-ass type.”

At Ros’s expression, Cyn lifted a shoulder. “You keep me around to say the non-PC shit out loud. It’s in my job description.”

“Just don’t say it around her. Or him.”

“I know how to have tact. Or rather, I’ve seen it done. I can probably fake it.”

“Unlike an orgasm,” Lawrence said.

Cyn bared her teeth at him. “Faking tact is about being polite. Faking an orgasm is a lie to the universe that could shatter its foundation. More importantly, it’s a waste of my fucking time.”

Lawrence blinked. “Well, thank God you added that. The universe thing was so poetic I thought Skye had possessed you.”

“Can I beat him?” Cyn asked Ros.

“Do your best the next time you’re sparring with him at Roughnecks,” Ros said absently, referring to the boxing gym they used for workouts.

Picking up on her change in mood, Cyn nudged her. Lawrence shifted closer, offering reassurance from both sides. “She’s the most level-headed of all of us, Ros,” Cyn said. “All that spiritual juju.”

“I know. I just feel worried. I don’t know why, but my intuition is usually on the mark.”

“I expect it’s coming from his family. That cousin of his is a calculating dick. The aunt gives me the creeps.”

“From how Skye described them, she’s the zealot,” Lawrence agreed. “Skye says her certainty she’s right, that she’s acting in his best interest, sends any conflicting information right to the mental spam folder, so it doesn’t interfere with her world view.”

Ros brushed her glossy nails over his clipped beard and met his gold-flecked green eyes. In certain lights, they held a trace of blue. “I can hear Skye saying it. Probably in her Mark Gatiss’s Mycroft voice. What did she find? I’m sure she dug into them.”

Lawrence’s lips quirked. “Didn’t find anything other than some questionable uses of the collection plate funds.”

Ros studied him. “But you’re still on the same page with Cyn about them. Particularly the aunt.”

“People don’t need a criminal background to unleash hell on you. I remember two guys we lost because their team thought a woman was in trouble. When they’re close enough, she detonates the suicide vest under her burka. To increase the trust factor, she had her six-year-old daughter with her. The survivors remembered the look of certainty on her face, damn near bliss. So, yeah.”

He cleared the shadows out of his gaze with effort and attempted a smile. “That kind of crazy aside, best not to overlook how dangerous a woman can be. Ever.”

Or how appealing a dangerous man could be, especially one who delivered a statement like that, with his lips curved in that kind of smile. His tanned skin showed the genes of his Mexican father, while the handsome weathering of his face proved how much time Lawrence had spent exposed to extreme elements.

Ros let him see the heat her thoughts gave her, because she knew it would also help him balance the dark memories he’d just stirred.

She turned her attention back to Vera and Rev. No one was immune from the vulnerabilities their past gave them. Ros knew the wounds Vera carried in her heart. No matter her worries about the unlikeliness of the pairing, Ros felt a healing vibe from Rev, particularly in what he wanted to offer Vera.

She hoped his family wouldn’t cause Vera any problems she couldn’t handle, but her family would have her back if they did. Ros would make sure of it.

Vera continued Rev’s tour through the club, letting him see everything. Her short “experiment” had both narrowed and expanded his senses. Anything happening between a Domme and sub caught his attention, his body getting the direct impact of what his mind was processing, while he lost his sense of anything beyond this moment and the next. And the next.

Because of the arousal, the adrenaline, the nerves that made his skin feel like he was out in a summer rain, he knew he was at a gear that might be tuned a little too high. She knew it, too, her hand always upon him. Whenever he got too lost in a spiraling fog of sensual need, her voice would cut through it and bring him back to her.

But eventually the fog got too thick. He misstepped and bumped against her. When she turned toward him, her hand on his shoulder and waist, he curled his arms around her, buried his face in her neck and shoulder. He wanted to bite, to kiss and lick her with the same intensity he’d seen in that male lying on his back, looking up at the sweet, wet and musky gateway to relief for his cock.

It was the wrong thought. His body acted without his brain, swinging them around and putting her against the wall. The sconce mounted there cast red light on everything within its range. A framed photograph next to it showed a man bound on an X-shaped cross, his arms up and out. He was thin, his skin stretched taut over ribs and hip bones. A woman knelt at his feet, her head bowed, her hand on his ankle, her cheek to his knee.

Another woman, in heeled boots and nothing else, was beating him with a flogger. The photo was black and white, except for an artful touch of color, revealing the reddened marks on his chest, and the Domme’s dark red hair. Or maybe it was the effect of the light.

His hands flexed on Veracity. Rev almost had her feet off the floor as he pushed his body against her, his cock against her stomach. He recalled himself enough to freeze there, but though he could flex his hands on her waist, he couldn’t make himself let go, back off, apologize. His neck was rigid, his head canted low as he tried to figure out what was happening, what had hold of him.

“I do, Rev,” she said, telling him he’d muttered it. “It’s all right. You’re all right.”

He tuned back in enough to see she had no fear of him. That was good. He wasn’t afraid of himself, because he was familiar with being out of control. The current that would grab hold of him and take him where it willed was a river he’d known from the time he was little.

But he wasn’t little, and this wasn’t the same. Not exactly. He was caught in a roaring rush of a man’s feelings. He wanted something from her so much he wasn’t sure he knew how to stop himself from taking it.

He told her that, his voice odd and rough. She dipped her chin, lifted a hand to someone outside his view, but when he would have looked that way, she put a firm hand to his face, keeping his eyes on hers.

“That’s easy, Rev,” she said. “I tell you when you can take. Right?”

He thought it through. He had no sense of time. He often didn’t, not when this feeling came upon him, because it wasn’t relevant, but at her words, he was able to find his center. He focused on her breath, her scent, the feel of her clothes against his. She’d lifted one foot and had it wrapped around the back of his calf, her spiked heel sliding against his slacks. It brought their bodies into a tight fit.

He'd heard a lot of crude language tonight, but spoken in tones of reverence, full of raw feeling. I want to eat your pussy. Please let me suck your cock, Master. Please. Fuck me, Mistress. Please. Let me serve your cunt. I want you to show me your gorgeous tits. Play with your nipples.

Please your Master.

Please your Mistress.

Please.

He groaned and pushed harder against her. The shot of sensation through the root of his cock, into his testicles, was something he hadn’t earned. But how could he pull back? Her hand had moved to his ass and was stroking the curve, nails digging in to encourage the movement. He got one hand up and put it by her neck, his thumb against her pulse, fingers clamped over her shoulder.

“Mistress…”

“Kneel to me, Rev.”

It was difficult, but she’d given him an order, and when he latched onto that, it pulled the rest of him into line. He went back to one knee, leaning against her thigh, his breath hot through her skirt. He was steadier there, could almost reach himself. Almost.

He thought of the Lord, walking on the water while his disciples floundered in a turbulent sea. He forced up his chin and looked at his Mistress. She was serene, stern, and held knowledge in her eyes. As she’d said, she knew the ways of this world. She was his shepherd here.

“It’s time to listen to some music.” She put a hand on his shoulder and stroked. “They’re doing karaoke on the top floor, and they have a dessert bar. Do you want some pie?”

Her steady warmth filled him. Cocooned him, took the worries and chaos from his heart. He put his head against her knee, and she caressed his back. She’d told him he didn’t need to apologize until she told him he’d done wrong, but a man needed to be a man. He rose and touched her face. “Did I hurt you?”

“No. You are very, very strong, Rev, but I’ve never known a man with such a gentle touch. You could hold a charging bull at bay without giving him so much as a bruise.”

Her brow creased at his startled expression. “Did I say something wrong?”

“No. Just…” He wasn’t trying to conceal it; he just didn’t want what her words had stirred in his memory to distract from his moment. Then Rev saw Lawrence, Ros’s man. He was nearby, leaning against a high top. Nursing a canned soda and watching his surroundings.

“They thought you were in trouble.” Shame swept him, but Veracity shook her head, not allowing it.

“They were ready if I signaled that I was. We look after one another here. The DM was here first, but Lawrence came right on his heels. I let them know I was fine. Because I am. We are. Aren’t we?”

She smiled up at him, a simple, beautiful thing. She had no doubts. This was her place of faith, he realized. She knew her path here.

She wasn’t rattled, but from the heat in her body, the soft look of her mouth and light in her silver eyes, touched with red, she also wasn’t as calm as she might appear.

“This is different for you, too, isn’t it?” he asked.

She required honesty from him. He wanted that to be a two-way street. He also wanted her trust. The pain of memory he saw said she understood what he was asking.

“Yes,” she said. “I don’t know what to make of it. So I think music and pie will give us a breather.”

“Do they have peach pie? Don’t have to be fresh. I like it out of a can, too.”

Her lips curved. He saw relief, and gratitude, that he hadn’t pressed for more.

“We’ll find out.”

When they moved toward the stairs, Lawrence had disappeared, reassured by some signal of Vera’s, or maybe he’d just recognized his presence was no longer needed.

Rev would talk to the man, though, to assure him of his intentions. This was Veracity’s family, and Lawrence was a direct line to Ros, the head of that family.

When they reached the top floor, he saw the karaoke room had a name, offered on a neon sign over the entrance to it. “The Breathing Room.” Appropriate.

As promised, there was a non-alcoholic bar that offered desserts, as well as the quick comfort foods most bars had. The stage and karaoke machine were in use, a hefty man with golden beard and blond hair doing a decent version of the Shirelles “Will You Love Me Tomorrow?”

He had backup singers, a middle-aged Asian lady with a bob cut, wearing thigh high boots and a shimmering red dress. The other woman was so pale Rev wondered when she’d last seen sunlight. She wore a schoolgirl uniform with a very short plaid skirt. She had long blonde hair, fluffed out like a lion’s mane.

While this wasn’t a play area like the floors below, the protocols were still in place. Some subs knelt at the sides of their Master or Mistress, while others stood attendance behind or next to them. But there were also people acting the way he’d expect any friends hanging out together to do.

A lean black man with gold dreadlocks rose from the table he was sharing with another man. As he headed their way, Rev saw tribal tats circling his biceps. He wore belted jeans, boots and nothing else. His torso was like a wiry cable, though he had muscled arms and well-developed shoulders.

He’d been headed toward the bar, but when he saw Vera, he detoured in her direction. Rev got the assessing look he was starting to expect, but it had a different tone from how Giorgio and other Doms had looked at him. This was more man to man, a look between equals. Two male submissives.

“We have a booth over there, Mistress, me and Trey, if you’d like to share it with us.”

“Sounds good, Sy. Who’s in the running for bragging rights tonight?”

Sy grinned. He had a wide, expressive mouth, the bones of his face cut sharp, his brows dark and thick, one pierced with a gold ring. “Tonight’s mostly been a competition for the ‘I Need To Keep My Day Job,’ award, but these three aren’t too bad. You missed an epic Bee Gees mashup with Master L and Frank, and their current pet. They’re in town from Baton Rouge on some business and decided to traumatize us with their vocal stylings. Everyone’s having a hell of a lot of fun. Converting the top floor to talent show-offs and snacks was a good idea. Mick deserves kudos on that idea. And the dessert chef they hired…wow.”

“Well, Cyn got pissed one night when her sweet tooth acted up and all they had were bowls of peppermints.”

Sy did a mock shudder. “And as we all know, when Cyn gets cranky, somebody might end up dead. You need anything from the bar?”

“Bring me a sampler tray, and a couple bottles of cold water. If they have peach pie, a slice of that. Put it on my tab.” She looked at Rev. “You want coffee with your pie?”

“Yes ma’am, that’d be fine. But I should pay.”

Sy lifted a hand. “Let it be my treat, man. I owe the TRA wonder women.”

When Sy moved away, Veracity headed for the booth he’d noted, handling the explanation along the way. “Sy and Trey are musicians. They do other jobs to support the habit, but TRA helped them broadcast their talents a little more strategically this year. It's upped their studio and band fill-in jobs. As well as their own group’s gigs.”

“What do they play?”

“They can do anything, but they like their blues, rock and jazz mix ups. Some funk.”

From Sy’s arm definition, Rev guessed the man was a drummer, and Trey did guitar or keyboard. As Vera introduced them, Rev noted Trey wore a T-shirt from one of the Frenchmen Street clubs over his jeans. He also had arm tattoos and blue eyes gazing soulfully from beneath shaggy brown hair. Rev expected Trey had no trouble catching female attention.

The man had risen from his chair and nodded deferentially to Veracity as they approached. Rev wondered if both men had done sessions with Vera here. Like what she’d just done with him, only less short, because they were obviously experienced submissives.

Rev wasn’t sure how he felt about that. Veracity slid into the booth, making room for Rev on the outside. Trey was on her other side, but with more space between him and Vera, a reassuring signal. When Sy returned, he sat next to Trey. He put the sample dessert platter and water in front of Vera, and coffee and peach pie at Rev’s elbow.

“Have what you need?” Vera asked. From the quirk of her lips, he could tell she understood it was a loaded question, but Rev gave her a warm look back and nodded.

“Yes ma’am. This looks real good.”

When conversation started up between the three, the topics mostly revolved around the musical performances, and what was happening on the floors below. Rev wasn’t excluded, but the men didn’t speak to him. Not until Vera straight out said, “You have my permission to talk to Rev directly.”

Another way the boundaries set here, the structure, took pressure and worries off of someone new like him, letting him concentrate on what his Mistress wanted.

He did notice that Sy and Trey gave him the same once-over that Lawrence had. They didn’t abdicate looking out for a woman just because she was a Dominant. He liked that, even as he still felt less pleasant twinges thinking of more intimate experiences they might have had with Veracity.

It wasn’t knowing she’d been with them. It was not knowing if, in this world, it was entirely possible she would be with them again, even while Rev was seeing her. He didn’t like that idea at all. Not just because of his feelings for her, but because of what that would say about how she viewed what their relationship was, where it was going.

Leave it, Rev. Let it lie. You letting what you want interfere with what the Lord is giving you in this moment.

A beautiful woman at his side, wanting to be with him, wanting to share things with him.

The Shirelle singers finished to enthusiastic applause. The next person wasn’t a singer, but a young woman who visibly shook as she moved onto the stage. Several people called out encouragement to her.

“You’re fine, Lottie. You’re good, girl.”

She didn’t seem to hear them. She swallowed and stared at the paper in her hand as if it was the only thing keeping her upright and on the stage.

Sensing her distress, Rev set down his fork, but Vera’s hand was on his thigh. “It’s okay,” she murmured. “Her Domme’s got her.”

“Lottie.”

Proving it, a Mistress two tables away from them spoke. She had spiky black hair and wore snug jeans on her long legs, a tucked-in T-shirt molding firm curves. She leaned forward, bracing booted feet on the floor. “What are you reading?”

“It’s from a letter Na…Nathaniel Hawthorne wrote to his wife Sophie. It made me think of you, Mistress. This one section of it.”

“Then read it to me. But put the paper away and look at me. I’m sure you know it by heart.”

The girl managed it, though not quickly. She creased the paper several times with her nails after she folded it. She wasn’t disobeying. She was actively struggling not to bolt.

“Come on, Lottie,” Sy murmured, his eyes full of compassion. “You can do it. Just follow Britt’s lead.”

Rev assumed Britt was her Mistress. Lottie tucked the paper in the back pocket of her jeans. She wore a light blue shirt with a fluttery neckline and small pearl buttons. A gold cross nestled in the valley between her collar bones.

She stuttered, the words spoken in a near whisper. No one called to her to speak up. Britt had the obvious lead.

“Again, Lottie. You’re doing well. Try to say it loud enough that everyone can hear.”

This time, as she held her Mistress’s gaze, she managed it. “‘I never, until now, had a friend who could give me repose...all ha—have disturbed me and, whether for pleasure or pain, it was still…disturbance. But p—peace overflows from your heart into mine. Then I feel that there is a Now, and that Now must be always calm and happy, and that sorrow and evil are but ph—phantoms that seem to flit across it.’”

“Very good.” Britt’s tone stayed firm, but pride filled it. “All right, once more.”

This time, Lottie’s back straightened. Her expression was less panicked, her voice stronger. She’d responded to her Mistress’s approval.

When she was done, Britt sat back. “Very good. Come sit with me.”

It was the cue for applause, which the audience generously provided. “Good job, Lottie,” Sy called out, raising his hands above his head to clap for her.

Lottie managed a terrified smile, and then headed for her Mistress, keeping to a measured pace with effort. When she knelt, Britt pulled her hair fondly, wrapping the tail around her fist to tilt her sub’s head back and nip at her throat.

“That was a major step,” Trey said. “She’s gotten up there twice before and scrambled back off without saying a word. We’ll make sure to go by the table and give her some strokes.”

“You just want to see her blush.” Sy nudged him. “Which happens every time you look at her, you fucking flirt.”

“Britt told me to do it,” Trey complained. “When she starts flirting back, we’ll know she’s making progress.”

“I confirmed it,” Vera told Sy. “He’s not making that up.”

Rev waited until Veracity chose a morsel of white cake from her sampler before he tried his pie. It was good. Mostly.

“Did your aunt used to make that?” his Mistress asked, her eyes upon him.

“Yeah. She liked to have me sing while she made it. Said it made the pie better.”

No one in the world would ever make a peach pie that matched Teena Joy’s. The memory added to the taste, but it also made his heart hurt. He’d celebrated her arrival in the arms of the Lord, because she’d want that, but the grief could still circle back. Veracity’s hand covered his as she leaned closer.

“A lot of people think this is only about sex.” She gestured to a Dom and sub near them. The sub wore a pair of jean shorts and a gold collar on her throat. Her breasts were exposed and nipples pierced, a chain between them strung with a gold infinity charm. “It can be. Nothing wrong with that, but it can also open up things that mean a great deal to us, make us vulnerable. And that makes us think of those we miss, who we’ve lost. You loved her.”

“I did. I do.”

Trey and Sy were involved in conversation, Trey sketching out music notes on a napkin. If it was deliberate, giving them privacy, Rev appreciated it.

“Mavis said she passed about a year ago.”

“Thirteen months and eight days.”

Veracity’s eyes held his. “That’s a major upheaval in your life. Mavis said you lived with her.”

“Yeah. I kept saying I should move out, but she’d say I wasn’t one of them kids who don’t earn his own way. She said the house was too big for her to rattle alone in it, so I said I’d stay, as long as I paid my share.”

A faint smile touched his lips. “She say, ‘we’ll be roommates, then, you and me,’ and shook my hand like we was just meeting for the first time. She was always teasing like that.” The humor curled tight around the next thought, sunk into it and disappeared. “Then she got sick, and wasn’t no question of it anymore. I took care of her, same as she took care of me for so long.”

“Did you wish to stay in the house, after she was gone?” Her lashes were dark and thick around her silver eyes.

“Didn’t give it much thought. Witford said she wanted the house sold and the proceeds to go to the church, and that was fine by me. The house wasn’t the same without her in it, and a good family lives there now. Finding a place closer to the school worked out good.”

He had his forearm against the edge of the table, casting a shadow of his hand next to his plate. She drew a line around it with one fingertip. “That first day, the way you did this to the shadow of my arm, it was like I could feel your touch on my skin.”

She put her hand on the shadow, and he couldn’t deny the tingle he felt in his palm. She had that way about her, drawing energy and sending it toward him like a blown kiss. Like a flock of blown kisses, landing everywhere on him.

She put her elbow on the table and propped her chin on her hand. “Did you keep anything of hers?”

“Got all the memories she gave me. I have a picture of the two of us from when I was little, soon after my momma died. Yolanda, Witford’s wife, she also brought me this ring Teena Joy always wore. She told Witford I was to have it. Just a little gold band, don’t even fit my pinkie, but I keep it in a box with a few things. It’s all right, Mistress. Giving is how you receive. Possessions don’t mean much.”

At her surprised expression, he added, “You look like you think I should have been given more. Everything the Lord gives me, every day. That’s all I need.” He closed his hand over hers. “And tonight I feel squarely on His good side.”

He’d won a smile from her, but she had another question for him. “When I said you could stop a bull’s charge, that meant something to you.”

He should have known she was going to circle back to that. “You have a way of hitting a nail straight on the head without looking where the hammer going, Veracity.”

She pursed her full lips. “Does that mean you’ll tell me about it?”

“I won’t say no to something you want to hear. When I was fifteen, I was on a youth trip to a farm. Some of them boys wandered off. Our assistant pastor noticed and asked me to go fetch them. They was in the bull’s pasture, throwing rocks at him, trying to get him to charge.”

“Proving why teenagers have to have superhero guardian angels to survive the idiotic things their underdeveloped brains tell them to do,” Veracity said dryly. “Though Cyn tells me it’s good to hold onto some of that stupidity as an adult, to keep things interesting.”

“She full of life, that one.”

Vera chuckled. “She’s full of something. That’s what she’d say to you.”

“But you love her like a little sister.”

“I do. She drives me crazy, even as I want to hold her and tell her everything will always be okay, because she has us. And now Mick, which I think is why she finally halfway believes we won’t all be swallowed up in the ground tomorrow.”

“She had it tough before you all.”

“She did. Her childhood was a nightmare.”

He nodded. “It always the ones like porcupines that need a hug. They gotta draw blood to let you be kind to them.”

“I’m going to tell her you said that. Tell me the rest of your story.”

“One boy with them was smaller, not so fast. He was smart enough to know it, but they’d made fun of him, called him a chicken, until pride overrode his smarts. He got in the pasture with them. When they aggravated that bull enough he started in their direction, they shoved the boy down and took off. Maybe they didn’t mean for the next thing to happen, but when he tried to get up, he twisted his ankle.”

Her mouth went to a thin line. “I’ve never been a fan of the term ‘boys will be boys.’ There shouldn’t be a minimum age requirement for compassion.”

“No, but it’s what you say, about the brain? Kids sometime don’t think about things until they happen. Especially when they in a pack. The brain don’t work at all then. Adults harboring a mean spirit because they afraid, or don’t like something different from what they know can be the same. When them boys reached the fence, turned and noticed he wasn’t with them, the bull was already charging. They froze.”

“You didn’t,” she guessed.

“He was so small. Trying to run, so scared…” Rev lifted a shoulder. “God helped me distract the bull, and we got him outside the fence. The youth pastor gave them all a stern talking-to. Then made them read scripture on the bus for an hour, while the others got to help the farmer milk the cows and feed the chickens. Turned out okay, thank the Lord.”

He turned his attention back to their surroundings, to what Trey and Sy were doing, to the flow of conversations around them, to Lottie, now sitting between Britt’s spread knees, her cheek on her Mistress’s inner thigh.

That wasn’t the whole story. The lifted hairs on Vera’s neck, her heart punching a harder beat against her ribs, told her so. “You stopped him, didn’t you? The bull.”

His gaze moved back to the table, rested there a moment, then he lifted it to her face. “Not me. I just said ‘God help me save this boy. Don’t let those boys live a life knowing they got him killed, bearing that burden. And don’t do that to his momma.’”

“So what happened?” She wouldn’t order it, because a command felt wrong for this. But she hoped he would tell her.

His brown eyes moved over her eyes and lips. “I ran at the bull and dodged to his right, catching one of his horns. We kind of turned in a circle, and I was able to bring him down to one knee and hold him. I didn’t want to hurt him. I sang to him. I don’t remember what.”

A half smile touched his lips. “But it settled him down a little. I still had a pocketful of grain from where they’d let us feed the goats, and I gave that to him. Once Sammy got to the fence and the others pulled him over it—he was shaking so bad, they had to help him—I let the bull go and walked out of there, calm like the farmer would, so he wouldn’t want to chase me. He was calm enough then that he let me.”

He touched her hair, feathering a lock through his rough fingers. Silas and Trey had stopped talking, and though she didn’t look their way, Vera was sure they were tracking the unprecedented sight of Mistress Vera hanging onto a man’s words like a besotted schoolgirl.

Knowing that didn’t stop her from doing it.

“You know the thing about that day I like to remember the most? Sammy was so scared he’d wet himself. One of the boys was wearing gym shorts under his jeans because he plays sports after school, and he gave him the shorts. They could have made fun of him, but seemed all of them let God open their eyes to how wrong they’d acted. They put their arms around him, and when it come time for them to sit on the bus reading the Bible, Sammy chose to sit with them. He say he got inside the fence and threw a rock or two, too, so he needed to read the same lessons.”

“Sounds like a good kid.”

“They all good kids. Just sometimes get off the path, like we all do.”

Vera gripped his hand. Rev’s eyes fell to that contact. “When I touch you and you talk about the strength and gentleness in my touch,” he said suddenly, “that strength is God’s, but it part of me, too. So I like that you feel it that way.”

Vera explored his palm, stroking his wrist as she considered his large hand, all it was capable of doing. As she did, his head tilted over hers, so she lifted hers to brush her nose along his jaw and cheek.

When she turned so she was hip to hip, shoulder to shoulder with him again, she dropped her touch to his thigh. Her tender caress became something else as she slid a proprietary hand up from there to fondle his balls and semi-erect cock through his slacks, and stroke the muscles of his abdomen above their waistband.

That gingerbread color darkened like brown sugar as she leaned against him and spoke in his ear. “Spread your knees wider for me, Rev. When we’re in a place like this, your cock should always be accessible to my touch.”

As he stole a glance at the other two men, she dug her nails into his testicle. Just enough bite to yank his attention back where it belonged. “A Mistress exercising ownership is normal here. Sy and Trey won’t stare while we’re at a table together like this. It’s rude and disrespectful to the Dominant. It’s only allowed if I give them the privilege of watching.”

“Why would they want to do that?”

“They’re like you, Rev. As they watch, they imagine their own desires, what shape they take under a Mistress’s hand. But I won’t do that tonight. Not until I know more about what you really need from my control.”

However, she would stroke and fondle to her heart’s content. His cock stiffened to full mast, filling up her grip the way a bat would if she slipped her hand up its broadening length.

She knew he’d be thinking of all the things she’d told him, about focusing his energy on her demands, about finding the soul in the gaze. Offering the soul and body together was a mind-altering combination. As she met his gaze, that energy linked with her own.

She wanted to take him to a private room and straddle him, rock back and forth in that seesaw motion that would increase the sensations between their bodies, the depth of their joining, the feel of him inside of her. She wanted his seed and her own response to make that movement all the more pleasurable, the climax even more intense. She would lean back on her elbows and have him suckle her breasts while she cupped his head, rubbed herself on him, felt his cock grow harder and heavier.

For tonight, that would stay the stuff of fantasy. Because though he was responding to her, they’d come up here because of the sensory overload. He was powerfully aroused, but his shoulders were tense, his eyes squinting a little as he processed her touch, what it meant, with all the noise and humanity around them.

She didn’t deny something strong was going on between them, but that was all the more reason to slow it down. He needed a slower pace, and maybe she did, too. She was the Domme, in control and in charge of his wellbeing, for this. She’d told him as much, and she would live up to it, taking care of him in the ways she knew. The Mistress in her knew the restless, unresolved feelings he might be feeling could shoot him into sub drop. He needed grounding.

“Sy, Trey.” Vera caught their attention. “Would you provide some instrumental backup to Rev while he sings?”

Sy gave her a surprised look, followed by speculation, the experienced musician surfacing. “Sure he wouldn’t prefer to choose something on the karaoke machine? Singing with a live band is a different animal.”

“He prefers live music. He sings for his church. He’ll keep pace.” She disengaged her hand from Rev’s and tapped the top of it, bringing him out of his head. “Will you sing for me, Rev?”

A look of surprise, followed by relief, for the familiar. It told her she’d made the right call. “I’ll do anything you like, Mistress.”

“Good. Go to it. They’re going to handle the music.” She tipped her head toward Sy and Trey.

Rev rose, moving toward the stage as if drawn there by a magnet. Something in him recognized the need for grounding, but it was a comfort zone he hadn’t requested; he’d waited until she’d offered it to him.

Sy raised a brow. “He any good, Mistress? I’m not questioning the request. Just want to do what we can to make him look good.”

She bounced her eyebrows at him. “That’s not going to be a problem.”

“C’mon, Sy,” Trey said. “She’s got a surprise for us.”

“Okay, but if he asks us to play Air Supply, I’m out.”

“Don’t worry, honey.” Trey patted his head and fended off the expected punch. “We all know your hard limits.”

Trey shot Vera his trademark panty-wetting smile as Sy snorted. The two men went off to join Rev.

Rev was already looking more in his element. Vera caught snippets between the three men about keys, pacing, tone. Things musicians talked about. She watched their doubting expressions become more relaxed, but they shifted back to surprise when Rev shut off his microphone. She suspected Rev had noted the room was half the size of the church. She could tell Trey and Sy thought they’d have to adjust their own sound so as not to drown him out.

Boys, you have no idea , she thought.

She noticed Ros, Skye and Cyn coming in. Lawrence and Tiger, Skye’s man, were with them. They grabbed a nearby table, Ros nodding to Vera.

Rev picked up the tambourine and started working it to a beat. As he did, he hummed a few bars of the song he wanted. Trey and Sy picked up on it, then they were ready. Vera felt her heart accelerate as they launched into Jackie Wilson’s “Higher and Higher.”

The music had the power to make toes tap, turn heads from the bar, and get people to their feet to dance. But then Rev started singing.

“Your love…lifted me higher…than I’ve ever been lifted before…”

Sy visibly started and exchanged a look with Trey, who gave him a mouthed what the fuck . When the men grinned in her direction, Sy shook a finger at her.

“I’ll be at your side forever more…”

Vera had her hands in a knot under the table, her body canted forward as she met Ros’s blue gaze. Cyn looked thrown, and Skye surprised, in a delighted way. Tiger and Lawrence exchanged a look like Trey and Sy’s, the one people had when they discovered a “normal” person could sing like a Motown great.

But Rev had more than that. She’d wondered if it could only be felt in a church space, but as what she’d experienced that day began to build in his voice, it spread out and gripped the room. This wasn’t a worship audience, but it made no difference to him. As the power in his voice expanded, the energy behind it made itself known. It brought people to their feet, swaying or dancing, singing the words with him. As he put one hand in the air, they followed suit, celebrating the joy Rev was putting in the music.

“Higher than I’ve ever been lifted before…”

When the song started to reach its conclusion, Rev, double tapping the tambourine, leaned in and said something to Sy.

Sy’s response was loud enough that Vera caught it. “Yeah, man. Get it. We’re with you.”

“Bold choice,” Trey added. “Let’s rock it.”

The music bounced out of the ending of Jackie Wilson’s classic, and Sy used the metal brush on the drums to preface Kiki Dee’s “I’ve Got the Music in Me.”

“Ain’t got no troubles in my life…”

Trey did the flourish, his hips moving to the beat as he worked the keyboard, and Sy switched out to the sticks again.

Rev didn’t overpower a song to impress. He sang it the way it was supposed to be sung, with the right emotions. Joy, reflection, hope, they were all there, along with that other thing. Something like when she channeled Mistress energy and connected with a sub. In that moment, they were in touch with something bigger, even as it didn’t change his earthly needs. And her own.

She was glad her friends were here to see it, feel it, because even those words didn’t capture it adequately. Sy’s amazed look made her laugh out loud, her heart full. And close her eyes to feel it inside her, all the way to the soul.

When she opened them, Cyn was standing beside her. The woman’s gaze was fastened on Rev with curiosity, but also a wariness that was second nature to her. Power like this could crack open the toughest person.

But Vera had no fear of Rev. Hurt might come from missteps as he found his way. Once he found it, she might have to accept the likelihood she would be his “gateway” Domme. A first Domme was rarely the last one, especially for a sub who’d held the need in him all his life.

She didn’t care for the thought, but that was expected at this stage, too. She wouldn’t let him go until it was time, but when it was time, she’d know, because the idea would hurt less then than it did now, in the powerful flush of their beginning. She’d gone through that cycle with Whistler, then Trey, but both men could still play with her easily, club friends with benefits.

She let all that go, because it was interfering with this, witnessing how Rev was captivating and energizing everyone. Moments like this were meant to be celebrated, not drained by future worries.

Rev circled back to an earlier lyric to bring it to a close, and put his own spin on it. Instead of saying he would be keeping his feet firmly on the ground, he locked his eyes upon her and sang it a different way.

“Keeping my knees firmly on the ground.”

He dropped to them then, for her.

Appreciation for the showmanship made the ceiling vibrate with cheers and whoops. He wasn’t aware of that, his eyes on her, registering her flush of pleasure and her response, strong enough to compete with what he’d put into the song.

He bowed his head to her, breathless, his shoulders lifting and falling.

There was singing for celebration, for mourning, for finding your way. For reassuring oneself, when you felt lost or unbalanced.

She’d brought him into an environment where he could experience all of that. That short session they’d done, followed by this, had turned his singing into an emotional catharsis that tears, edginess or sleep provided other subs.

Trey and Sy kept jamming out, transitioning the audience toward the normal dancing and bopping to the music. Grounding them as well.

Realizing Rev was waiting for an acknowledgement, she rose. As she left the booth, she touched Cyn’s arm, another reassurance.

When Vera came to him, she put her hand on Rev’s shoulder. He pressed his forehead to her leg, his hand resting on her foot. Then he kissed her knee, his mouth moist through the mesh of her stocking.

Sy and Trey’s gazes were on him, and her. They all knew about turning points, a full-fledged, honest, uncalculated surrender to a Mistress. A letting go of any defenses. Many subs, caught in the maelstrom, might do it long before they knew the Dom well enough, but with the right Dom, one experienced and looking out for their interests, it was okay.

Because as much as the Domme herself, they were embracing that lack of control they needed, an integral part of themselves. The Domme was just the conduit, the one who took them on the journey and introduced them to the world they wanted and needed, that they couldn’t be whole and complete without.

She’d had the honor of being that conduit before. Despite her thoughts of only a moment ago, she realized she wanted this to be way more than that. And it wasn’t just because of that nagging emptiness, the pain of watching the other women in her circle find it.

She’d always wanted a relationship where she and her sub were bonded so closely there was no doubt it was divinely inspired. Fate, destiny. Whatever it wanted to be called.

Her heart and soul said it was right here, kneeling at her feet. Later she might rein herself back from that thought, but right now, she had no problem letting that belief enclose both of them.

Dropping to her heels, she wrapped her arm around his back, curving herself over him and murmuring the words she wanted to say. And that he needed to hear.

“You’re mine, Rev.”