Chapter Three #5
“Yeah, she really ripped the rug out from beneath you, huh? Mistress Vi has that effect on people.” Lowering to his haunches, Fordham sighed and tipped Reaux’s head back. “Eyes are starting to focus again, good. You want some water?”
He thought he nodded his head, but somehow his chin refused to lift again.
Fordham chuckled and nudged it up again. “It’s a different matter entirely, being on the other side, isn’t it? Exhausting. Close your eyes for a while. Violet won’t be long, then she’ll see to your aftercare.”
Reaux liked aftercare. A scene was fun, exciting, testing his wiles as a Dom, and his creativity. But aftercare was the quiet part where he could relax and tend to a sub’s basic needs while feeding his own primal desire to nurture someone.
For years, that someone had been Violet.
Whether she would return his care in due kind was another matter.
It wouldn’t hurt to close his eyes for a few minutes; he was insanely tired. The blanket was keeping him warm, although his muscles shivered with a mix of shock and the cooling sweat coating his skin.
How the hell did subs do this several times a week without burning out?
With his chin back on his chest, Reaux dozed for a while. Part of his brain was still tuned in to the outside world while the rest of it went to bed for a nap; he heard the clink of a glass touching wood to his left, the tap-tap-tap of fingers typing out messages on a phone or so he presumed.
A particular fragrance tickled his nose, rousing him from the quiet, and he woke with a kernel of jealousy instantly blooming in his chest as he watched his woman, his Violet, rolling up on her tiptoes to press her full, glossy lips to Fordham’s cheek.
Her smile was wide and honest, so genuine, he felt a pang of regret that it was going to take a lot of work on his part to have her smile at him that way again.
“Don’t kick him while he’s down, Vi.”
Her laugh was light. “I’m planning on kicking him down, out, and to the curb. Just maybe not today. Tomorrow’s looking hopeful, though.”
“Stone cold,” Fordham replied with a shake of his head. “Need me for anything else?”
“No, thanks. I’ve got him from here.”
“Be nice,” the Dom admonished before walking away, whistling under his breath.
Violet exhaled slowly, running her hand through her hair so the dark brown strands filtered through her fingers. She bent and removed her boots, then padded over to the couch in bare feet, hesitating before taking a seat at the far end, to his left.
Placing a throw pillow on her lap, she said quietly, “Lay down, Boudreaux.”
“There was a time when you called me Reaux,” he mumbled, collapsing on his side and settling his head into the plush cushion with a sigh. Oh, that was much better; his body offered thanks for the reprieve of trying to stay upright.
Her hand rested lightly on his shoulder, on top of the blanket. “A different time, with different people. The past is in the past, and it will stay there. Are you warm enough?”
He snuggled deeper into the couch, rubbing his cheek against the pillow while wishing it was her lap. “Yes, Mistress. Thank you.”
“Did you drink anything?”
He shook his head, already floating again. It was liberating to be this free, to set aside everything and leave it in her capable hands, even if she hated him more than the plague.
When she heaved a disgruntled sigh and slid her hand under his cheek, raising his head to a safe position, he felt a glass press against his lower lip and instinctively drank, finishing it in a few long gulps. “You know better than to skip hydration.”
He did, but then, he was barely in control of his body, let alone his thoughts.
As he rested his cheek back on the pillow, he felt her fingers stroking over his wrist, lighter than a feather, checking to make sure he hadn’t injured himself.
He said nothing, not wanting to distract her, because the moment he opened his mouth, she’d shrug the hardass Domme facade back into place.
So he pretended—mostly—to doze, and simply enjoyed the touch of the woman he loved more than all his favorite things rolled together.
She was thorough, he’d give her that; she checked both hands and wrists where the cuffs had held him captive, every inch of his body she could see where that damn flogger had brought pain and pleasure with every lash.
She hadn’t broken the skin, he knew that much.
It was a clinical touch, very impersonal, but at least she wasn’t wearing gloves.
After she inspected what she could see, she sat back and rested her hand on his hair, absently playing with the strands. It took him a few hazy moments to realize she was mumbling incoherently to herself.
Never before had they interacted like this—he was always the one in the position of caregiver.
The one who checked wounds and settled the highs and lows of her emotions after a scene.
The one who stroked away aches and pains, who tended to the simple yet vital basic needs when her system was depleted.
It was an enjoyable experience on one hand, yet he’d never felt so vulnerable.
Would this change things between them? Could his submission dampen the hostility she felt toward him, rekindle the love for him she’d once nourished and now starved?
Perhaps. Perhaps not.
Violet believed he’d thrown her aside because she wasn’t enough for him, which was absolutely not the case, but how did he explain to her in a way she’d listen to that he hadn’t been enough for her at that point in time?
He’d seen what she was even then, knew she was destined to be someone greater than just his submissive, and taken steps to ensure she achieved that milestone.
She probably wouldn’t be thrilled by the idea that he’d let her go to spread her wings and fly before he reeled her back in when the time was right, either.
Somehow, a simple decision he’d made for her benefit was coming back to bite him.
Still, maybe there was hope. He refrained from smiling as her fingers massaged his scalp idly, the way he used to do with her when their roles were reversed. He’d spent hours like this, in the same companionable silence, using the time to strengthen the bond between them with just a quiet touch.
Whatever happened next, he needed to stick with his decision and ride the wave of her anger. If he tried to take command, if he made the wrong move, there was no doubt in his mind that she would flit away into the night like a shooting star, gone in a blink.
For now… well, he was completely under her spell.
Violet
They stayed on the couch for over an hour.
Personally, she blamed her own tiredness for the lapse in judgement, and her own weakness for allowing him to get under her skin again.
Aftercare wasn’t something she stepped out on unless the sub demanded alone time after a scene—a rarity, but it did happen.
Some just seemed to handle the overload of emotion better on their own, although she did assign someone to watch over them in case of subdrop.
Discreetly, of course.
Sitting quietly on the couch, contemplating her life from the time Boudreaux reentered it, stroking his hair and reminiscing about the days when it was her head on his lap, his hand toying lazily with her hair as her system settled from the ultimate high…
it affected her in a way she hadn’t anticipated.
There was a hole inside her—a gaping, ragged wound where he’d torn her heart thoughtlessly from her chest—that hadn’t even started the healing process since that horrible day. Maybe the endless bleeding had stopped, but the wound remained.
Giving him the kind of aftercare she usually only offered to subs she cared about on a deeper level, the kind where her emotions were stirred, wasn’t an instant cure-all but the hole felt less… raw around the edges.
Was it the aftercare or the scene?
Hmmm, that was something to consider.
When Boudreaux yawned and began to stir, Violet resisted the urge to shove his head off the pillow and smother him with it. Forgiveness was not now or ever on the table when it came to him; she wasn’t heartless, but forgiving him meant opening herself on levels she wasn’t prepared to survive.
Keeping that in mind, she slipped out from under him, leaving the pillow and his head on the couch, then rose and set her hands on her hips.
The blanket covered his shoulders, leaving his chest exposed.
Flogger marks littered his skin in shades of pink and red, but she hadn’t done any lasting damage; there wasn’t so much as a nick.
She waited until he opened his eyes. “Do you need any pain relief?”
As elegant as ever despite the stiffness of his muscles, Boudreaux sat up and stretched out his arms like he was waking from the longest sleep. “I’m good. I think.”
“I’ll put some coffee on then.”
He struggled to stand, the blanket curling around his bare calf. “I can do that, Mistress.”
Violet held her palm up. “Go to the guest bedroom and get dressed. Seeing as the contract started this morning, I imagine Evander has already supervised the transfer of your personal possessions from your cabin to mine.”
He sighed deeply. “Can we at least talk like civilized adults over coffee if I get dressed?”
“This is me being a civilized adult, Boudreaux. Take a shower if you want one; the general layout of the cabins are the same.” In other words, she thought, find your own damn way to the bathroom. “Are you hungry?”
“I could eat, Mistress.”
God, she hated that he called her that without any discomfort at all. Instead, it just flowed appropriately off his devil’s tongue at the right time, with the perfect inflection.
The easiest option for food was the restaurant, but there was no way in hell she was dragging this ridiculous facade into public and opening it to speculation and gossip.
As a Mistress of Serenity, she’d nurtured her reputation carefully—no full-time submissives, definitely not a live-in one, and her time, attention, and favoritism was bestowed upon all.