Chapter 17
17
brAIDEN
I leave Madden in my office, nursing a broken jaw and some kicked-in ribs. It’s no more than I gave him when we were lads, and less than he deserves, but I don’t have time to pay the full bill now.
Fiona’s pressed against the wall in the hallway, like she was blown there in a storm. She cocks her hip and starts to say something, and I don’t trust she can get it out without my needing to kill her. “Don’t start,” I say, wagging a finger in her face. She’s smart enough to shut her feckin’ gob.
Before I’ve caught my breath, I’m pounding on the pool house door, hard enough to make the glass rattle in its frame. “Open up, Samantha!”
Of course, she doesn’t do it.
I kick at the lock, but the bolt is better than it looks. The wood around it shudders but holds fast. “I’m coming in, Samantha. Make this easy on yourself.”
Nothing .
She told me once that I wasn’t allowed in the pool house without her express permission. But that was pretty much an engraved invitation she just left on my lap.
Besides, I’m her Dom. I decide when I get to enter.
I whirl to the pool deck behind me. There’s seating all around—chaise lounges framed in metal with matching chairs and tables. The three-legged tables are light for my needs, but one of those chairs will work a wonder.
It helps that all the momentum of my swing is focused on one metal leg. The glass door cracks on the first blow. I swing again, and a fist-size web of tempered squares breaks away. One more arc, and the entire door falls inside, shattering into a million jagged pieces.
The window shade sways crazily as I barge in, not bothering with lock or knob. I wade through the crumpled remains of the glass, ignoring its crunch underfoot.
She’s crouching at the foot of the bed. As I crash over to her, she scrambles like a crab, trying to flee sideways. I get one hand over her biceps and haul her to her feet.
“No,” she’s chanting. “No, no, no.”
But she’s not looking at me. She doesn’t seem to know I’m leaving a perfect ring of bruises on her arm.
She’s staring at the glass.
It’s spread like a fan across the floor, turning to crystal fire in the light above the sink. There’s more of it than I thought there would be. One door shouldn’t fill the room.
“No,” she cries. “No, please, no.” Her palm is pressed against her temple, sealed to the line where her hair meets her face.
For just a moment, I think she’s bleeding. But then I realize I’ve trapped her in her past.
She stood at a window and watched her parents’ car explode. She was caught in a shower of glass that night. She still bears the scars today, the web of white worms she’s covering now .
“You’re not Giovanna,” I growl, pulling her hand from her face. “You’re Samantha Kelly.”
She stares at me like I’m shining with the fire of Pentecost.
“You’re Samantha Kelly,” I repeat, and I press her collar into her throat with the weight of my thumb. “And you’re fucking mine. Say it.”
She stares.
I shake her. Hard. “Say it, piscín ,”
Her teeth chatter. “I— I’m Samantha Kelly.”
“And?”
“I’m fucking yours.”
I clutch her hair and use it to pull her close enough to kiss. Her lips move like a drowning woman’s. She’s hot and she’s wet and I could drink her for hours if I didn’t have another point to make.
Pushing her onto the bed, I reach for her computer. Its cord isn’t long enough to do what I want, but it will give me a chance to find what I need. I loop the white line around her wrists, tight enough to keep her hands from moving, and then I lash her to the headboard.
“Say red ,” I tell her. “ Red , and I’ll stop.”
She doesn’t say a word. Instead, she thrashes like a marlin as I stomp into the bathroom. The towels are too heavy. The flannels too small. I find one of the flat sheets she uses for the bed—a waste of good linen when all she needs is a duvet. It takes her nail scissors to get the job started, but then I tear it into strips.
“Braiden,” she says as I carry my bonds out to the main room. She’s past her panic now, back to a grown woman instead of a lost little girl. Her voice is measured, like she’s talking to a judge in a courtroom. “We can talk about this.”
“The time for talking’s past.”
“I didn’t mean?—”
“You meant exactly what you did.”
“Please,” she begs, and she’s pitiful enough that I stop while I’m tying her ankle to the footboard. “The door,” she says, jutting her chin toward the shade I mangled when I broke in. “Anyone can see what you’re doing. Anyone can see us. See me.”
“You should have thought about that, piscín , before you started this game.”
I swap out the rubberized computer cord for my torn sheets. That lets me spread her arms to the edges of the headboard.
She’s splayed on the mattress, arms and legs wide. Her skirt’s rucked up around her hips, giving me a clear view of her cunt. That barely-there excuse for a shirt has twisted around her chest until it frames her right tit.
Her collar gleams, the emerald gathering all the light in the dim room and throwing it back in a thousand shades of green.
“Let me go, you motherfucker,” she says.
I laugh.
Now that she’s secured, I take my time getting undressed. I toe off my shoes and socks, covering them with my suit jacket. I strip the knot of my tie and run it through my hands, wondering how I’ll make her wear it.
I undo the top three buttons on my shirt. That’s enough to pull it over my head and drop it on the floor, where it’s quickly covered by my pants and boxers.
She got me hot and bothered this morning, when I nearly had her screaming my name in the conference room. My cock took quick notice of her riding me just now, when she broke into my office with her slutty makeup and her urgent need.
I’m hard enough to fuck her now, to plow hard, to stroke deep.
But she has a lesson to learn. Too many times, she’s tried to top from the bottom. She tells me what she wants, tells me what to do, how to do it, when, and no Dom in the world will put up with that, even from his sweetest little sub.
So my cock will have to wait.
And so will Samantha.
I start with her electric toothbrush. It stands on the bathroom counter like a brave little soldier, charged and ready to go into battle. I toss the brush attachment into the sink and go after her with the handle.
My little piscín may protest the open door. She may fight to break free of her bonds. She may call me names no smart sub would dare.
But she’s ready to come in less than a minute.
I bring her to the edge three times before I drop the handle on the floor.
She’s got ice in the mini-fridge.
Her cunt’s so hot the first cube melts to nothing while I’m pushing it in. I rub her clit with the second one, and then she takes four in her snatch.
I put a cube in my mouth and go after her tits. Her nipples are hard when I start, and they double in size as I play. I suck hard enough to leave marks and then I bite, layering the heat of my tongue with the chill of the ice until the cube melts to a single useless sliver.
“Please,” she begs. “Sir. Master. You’re right. You always are. I never should have come to your office. I had no right.”
“Oh, piscín, you still don’t understand.” I work her clit with my fingers, alternately stroking and tapping, tugging just enough to hurt. “You’re allowed in my office.” Stroke, tap, tug. “You’re allowed anywhere in my home.” Stroke, tap, tug. “You’re my wife.” Stroke, tap, tug. “Everything.” Stroke. “I.” Tap. “Have.” Tug. “Is.”
Her legs are shaking so hard, the bed is rocking. Tears stream from her eyes. Her mouth is stretched in a perfect O, and she’s holding her breath, ready to break. Ready for me to say: “Yours.”
I walk away from the bed.
She screams in frustration.
“Wrong answer,” I say from across the room. “Your job is to thank me. To accept whatever I do to you. Whatever I decide not to do. ”
I pick up one of the pool cues and balance it in my hands.
“By the way,” I say, as if we’re talking about the weather. “The mistake you made in my office was not coming into the room. Not showing off your body to Madden and Fiona. Not even riding my cock. You could have done all that…if you left your collar in its case.”
“I wanted—” she starts, and thinks better of it.
“I thought—” she tries again, but recognizes her mistake.
“Yes, Master.”
I look up sharply, to see if she’s mocking me. But her face is clear. Her eyes are wide. She’s honestly, finally, conceding.
I raise my knee and shatter the pool cue. Tossing the tapered tip to the floor, I’m left with the butt end. It’s as long as my forearm, the maple shaft polished to a mirror-like gleam.
She eyes it like it’s a live cobra. Her fingers curl around the torn sheet, as if she can shatter the headboard. As if she can escape.
I run my thumb along the inside of her thigh. She rises by reflex, hips leaving the bed in a silent plea. I sink three fingers into her cunt.
She’s soaked, from melted ice and her own sweet juices. She can take this. She can do everything I require her to do.
“Please don’t…“ she whispers. “I can’t… I’ll tear… I won’t…”
But she doesn’t say red.
As I slip the rounded end of the cue past her folds, she starts to sob. It’s hard for her to give up absolute control. I know that. That’s why I love her.
Once she’s holding the cue, I find the necktie I set aside. I slip it over her head so it dangles between her tits. The silk brands her as mine.
“Who are you?” I ask as I slowly pump the wood between her thighs.
She closes her eyes. “Samantha Kelly.”
“Who do you belong to? ”
“You,” she whispers. And then, as the friction builds, she says it faster. “You. Always you. Only you. Oh God, please, God, you.”
I stop one stroke shy of setting her free. This time, when she’s stranded, she’s silent except for her heavy breathing. Tears leak from beneath her closed eyes.
But she doesn’t beg.
Doesn’t issue orders.
Doesn’t even offer up a suggestion.
I pull the cue out of her snatch and roll it over her lips. She doesn’t understand for a moment. Then she shapes those lips into a perfect O. She arches her throat. She sucks her juices from the wood as I fuck her mouth.
The sound of her sucking is a battle hymn to my cock. My balls are as hard as granite. One good pull, and I could spill all over her pretty face.
I make myself slip the knots on her arms. I free her legs. I take the cue from her lips and force her over to the pool table, half-dragging, half-carrying her.
Her forearms settle on the green felt, my tie splayed in front of her. I kick her legs wide, just as a breeze blows through the shattered door. Her spine goes stiff, and she moans, “They’ll see me.”
I slap her bare bottom. “Isn’t that what you wanted? When you came into my office dressed like a slag?”
She shakes her head like a woman in a dream. “I wanted you. You’re the one. The only one. It’s you, only you, always, always you.”
The shade rustles again, shifted by the breeze. She tries to look over her shoulder. I spank her again, and she groans.
I lean close and whisper in her ear. “Look at you. Bent over the table. Dripping for me. Arse red from my hand.”
I smooth my fingers over that hot, flushed skin. Her whole body starts to shake. She flattens her hands on the felt. She grits her teeth as her knees begin to buckle .
And I sink into her from behind—my entire cock, all my weight. She screams my name as she shatters all around me. I keep her on her feet, digging my fingers into her hips, and then I’m as wet as she is, as hot as she is. She’s milking me and I’m filling her and neither one of us is fully human as we come and come and come together.
My throat aches when I finally let her go. The April night swirls behind me, cold fingers swiping down my sweaty spine, smacking my bare arse.
Her teeth start to chatter, and I pull her into my heat. We cross the room and collapse onto the bed. I find the duvet and pull it up to our chins, and I wrap her in my arms and legs.
I want to carry her back to the house. I have arnica gel there and a store of the chocolate she loves. I could feed her the dinner Fairfax prepared, make up for the meal we both missed. I could put her in my bed and keep her there forever.
She’d protest. I know she would. She won’t sleep in the big house until I atone for Birte.
I could order her to my bedroom. Use my Captain’s voice. Take away her choice.
But I want her to decide to come back.
So I press her close to my body. I kiss the spiderweb of scars at her temple. I wipe the tears from her cheeks and I stroke her hair and I tell her that she’s my piscín, that she’s magnificent, that I’ve never known anyone like her in my entire life.
“ Mo chailín maith ,” I breathe, so softly I’m not sure she hears. She sighs, though, relaxing against me. Another breeze steals through the ruined door, and I pull the covers close to keep her warm, holding her close as she drifts off to sleep.