SIXTH KNOT
The drive is short.
His place is above a mechanic’s garage with no signs outside, just a rusted staircase on the side and a metal door that groans when he shoves it open.
The place is cluttered as hell, too. Boots by the door, shirts flung over the back of chairs, old speakers stacked in a corner, empty beer bottles on the windowsill, magazines everywhere.
It smells like sweat and cologne, mixed with cigarette smoke, grease and metal.
It’s not a bad place at all to get railed.
He tosses his keys into a bowl on a cluttered counter, kicks off his boots at the entrance, and goes straight to the kitchen, cracking open the fridge.
“Beer?”
I nod, and he throws me a bottle. My throat’s fucking dry, and the first sip goes down too cold. Great thing to put your brain to sleep when you’re about to do something stupid—like being tied by your gang rival and fucked in the ass.
He jerks his head toward the hallway.
“Come on.”
His bedroom is bigger than I expected. Mattress on a metal frame with no headboard, covered by dirty, crumpled sheets. There are two chairs in the corner, a dresser, a big-ass closet, an ashtray full to the brim, and a small TV.
He walks over to the closet, and pulls it open with a very suspicious little smile. And I know immediately why.
Inside, hanging and stacked, is gear.
Ropes, coiled and neat. A row of ties. Handcuffs, real ones, heavy metal. Blindfolds. Leather straps. Chains. A fucking spreader bar. A couple of harnesses. Hooks. Things I don’t even have names for, but I can already feel what they’d do to me.
He scratches his neck.
“Not really my thing. My ex was the one who liked it. Left most of it behind, though.”
I step forward, run my fingers over a thick rope. The fibers are artificial and strong. I can already feel the burn of it, the drag against my skin.
“You ever use them?” I ask.
He shrugs.
“I’ve done the tying. It’s alright.”
I pick out two lengths of rope, one of the blindfolds, leather with padding, and hesitate at the spreader, but then take it too. Ryo takes a long chain and two leather cuffs.
I look at him.
“You know how to use all this?”
“Well enough not to kill you.”
“Good. That’s the line, then.”
Ryo sets everything down on the bed. He stretches his arms the same way he does before a fight, then rolls his shoulders. He’s absolutely ridiculous, this guy. I want to punch him in the face and I want him to punch me back.
I finish my beer, toss the bottle in the corner, and just start undressing. I feel the cool air over my skin as I peel away the heat of the night. Shirt, pants, socks. Nothing left.
Ryo doesn’t ask if I’m ready. He comes behind me, the ropes in hand, and palms the back of my neck like he’s pushing a dog into place.
“Arms behind your back,” he says.
I obey.
Ryo doesn’t like it. He makes a little noise with his tongue and calls me boring while grabbing both my arms and raising them, my forearms behind my head.
The movement pulls instantly at my shoulders.
He then forces my elbows tight together behind my skull—elbow to elbow—pressing the bones hard against each other.
The angle is awkward and uncomfortable, and strains the sockets in a way that never happened when Naoya did the tying.
The first rope bites in, and it’s not the good kind, like Naoya’s fancy shit.
Ryo wraps it tight around my forearms, just below the elbows, cinching them together loop after loop after loop, until the pressure makes my fingers tingle and my biceps scream from the upward strain.
He knots it hard, low between my shoulder blades this time.
A sharp pull yanks my elbows down and back, arching my spine and cranking my shoulders deeper into the stretch.
I hiss. The burn floods my upper back and shoulders.
Feels good.
Then he circles to my front, touches my chest, dragging the second rope across my collarbones. He loops it around, tight under my pecs, crosses it over and under again, squeezing my ribs. My breath stutters when he runs a hand up my throat and the rope follows.
He binds the line from my chest to my neck—not choking, but I damn sure feel it gets tighter when I breathe deep. He ties the knot off to the front, forcing me to feel the pull when I move, when I turn, when I try to look down.
Then he kicks at my ankles.
I spread wider, and he drops the spreader bar between my feet, strapping each cuff tight around my ankles, then kneels to adjust the bar’s length.
He forces my stance open. Shoulder-width, then more.
My knees protest, but I can’t close my legs.
Can’t balance properly. Can’t stand or walk without tipping.
Then he shoves me.
I fall back onto the bed, my bound arms caught under my head, biceps screaming from the sudden stretch—fucker almost dislocated my shoulders. My legs are forced wide, knees bent awkwardly, the muscles in my thighs trembling.
He lifts my head, slides the blindfold into place, and the world disappears.
I hear him stand. Walk. A soft click of a lighter. A slow exhale of smoke.
I lie still. The rope has my ribs compressed tight, suffocating me with every breath. My arms are pinned beneath my weight, useless, and my legs are spread wide. I’m just meat on a block, ready for slaughter, not play.
He says nothing for a long time.
Then his hands come to touch me again, sliding up my leg, sending a shiver down my spine. I feel him leaning over me, the mattress beside my head dipping.
“You’re really fucked up in the head, huh?”
“Yeah, I am. What you gonna do about it?”
He huffs a quiet laugh, the sound more like air leaving a tire, and I can feel his ashtray breath ghosting over my mouth.
“No safe word?”
“No.”
“You know how fucked that is?”
“I don’t care.”
“Yeah. I can tell.” He leans in, his dry lips ghosting over my own with every word. “Guess I’ll just stop if I feel like it.”
I want to know how far he’ll go if I don’t stop him. How much of me he’ll take, not out of affection, obviously, but out of spite. Out of instinct. Out of the pure fucking thrill of having me tied down like this, barely breathing, unable to close my legs, unable to touch back.
This isn’t like Naoya. Naoya checks the rope twice. Naoya listens to my body like it’s a language. Ryo doesn’t listen. Ryo will push me and try to break me.
Well, let him fucking try.
The mattress dips, then stills. For a second, I think he left somehow. Then—slap.
A sharp sting cracks across my cheek, suddenly enough to punch the breath right out of me. My head jerks. I feel the rope yank against my throat, and I laugh without meaning to, biting the inside of my cheek as the heat blooms on my skin.
“Fucking hell,” I mutter, licking the corner of my lip and tasting my own blood for the second time today. “Didn’t know you were into foreplay, you asshole.”
I can feel the warmth of his body suddenly hovering above mine again.
“Didn’t know you were into being my fuckmeat, princess.”
Then his teeth are on me, biting the side of my neck like a fucking mad dog. I twitch, but the ropes won’t give, and I realize how pathetic I must look, not even being able to flinch properly.
He laughs.
“You like that?”
“You gonna keep asking or actually do shit?”
He drags his hand down between my legs and slaps my inner thigh. I jolt again. The rope around my chest digs in deeper with the movement, and the bar between my ankles won’t budge.
“You don’t get to run your fucking mouth.” His hand lingers, fingers gripping deep into the flesh he just struck. “You’re tied up for me. That makes you mine for the night.”
His other hand moves up, flicking one of my nipples, then pinching it hard.
“Fuck—” I growl, but the word falls soft, buried under the sting. I’m hard—no way to hide it. My cock is up and twitching, fully visible, no shame.
“Sensitive?” he asks, not giving me any time to respond. He pinches my other nipple the same way.
I suck in air through my teeth.
“Should’ve done this sooner,” he mutters while playing with my nipples. “Didn’t know you were hiding such a slutty body. What else you got locked in that twisted little brain of yours?”
He runs both hands down my body now. Over my ribs, down my abdomen, fingers digging hard. His touch shifts between soft touches and sudden pain—another pinch, this time inside my thigh. Then a sharp slap to my hip. I twitch, hiss, buck uselessly against the spreader bar.
“That’s it,” Ryo says, voice breathless, like he’s getting off on the way I’m tied and useless. “Keep moving for me, bitch.”
“Will you fuck me already? I’m fucking bored.”
“Eager much?”
“Do you have some erectile dysfunction?”
His hand slaps my thigh hard, loud in the room. Then he grabs the rope line around my neck like it’s a leash and yanks my head up. It hurts like a motherfucker.
“You talk a lot, don’t you?”
I open my mouth to talk some more, but he stuffs two fingers past my lips, pushes hard on my tongue, down near my throat. I gag, the sound wet and disgusting in the air.
His fingers are ridiculously long, pressing down until drool spills from the corner of my mouth.
He twists them, rubs the inside of my cheek, drags the pads across my tongue like he’s testing the texture of it.
He shoves deeper once, forcing another gag out of me, and only then does he pull his hand back. It follows with a slap across my face.
“Fuck, look at you,” he breathes, and it’s the most turned-on I’ve ever heard someone sound. “Tied up, legs open, drooling. You love this shit.”
A wet sound—and then his spit lands on my cock. His fingers follow right after, lazily smearing it down the shaft. I groan, hips bucking, but the rope pulls again, dragging at my throat. I can’t do shit.
“You hard for me or for the ropes, slut?”
I grin at the dark.
“The rope, obviously.”
His palm lands again, flat across the head of my cock. It stings like fire.
“What? Will you let anyone tie you up like this if they promised to fuck you hard enough?”
“Just the ones who might kill me.”
That shuts him up for a second.