Chapter 12 #2
“Thank you, Master Wesley.” He turned, looking at his allover blush.
The stripes were already starting to fade except for the ones across his ass and thighs where I’d wanted to leave a longer lasting impression.
I felt pretty good myself. The muscles in my shoulders were well worked and warmed up and the tension in my body was gone.
I didn’t get what I got from being with Mira from anyone else, but I still got something out of it.
“This is nice,” Silas commented, grinning at me.
I chuckled at how thrilled he was by our scene and then held open the robe for him.
“Drink up that water, and I’ll get you your Coke.”
“Yes, Master Wesley.”
Silas preferred a specific aftercare routine from the Doms he scened with which was different than the one he had with his Domme.
All he wanted from me was some praise, a Coke, and for me to sit with him for a few minutes in one of the comfortable lounge spots while he drank it and came down.
The water was my thing. I insisted on it before the sugary soda.
When the water bottle was empty, I went to fetch him a Coke and cracked open the tab for him. “You earned this tonight. The way you took those strikes was impressive.” My eyes suddenly landed on a scene that was happening on the other side of the Dungeon.
The Dungeon was busy, so I don’t know why it caught my eye, but it did, as did the familiar heart-shaped ass, and curly blonde hair.
“Sir?”
I looked back at Silas a beat later. He was holding his Coke and looking at what had attracted my attention.
“Is that Mira?”
I nodded. It was.
“I can’t believe she’s scening with Professor Stahlbaum again.”
My head snapped downward to look at him as he sat on the leather love seat, his hand still firmly holding his dewy can of pop.
“Why?” My tone sounded a little bit too aggressive, so I tamped it down. “Why is that?”
Silas looked up at me and pressed his lips together, realizing he’d probably said too much.
“Tell me, Silas. Please.” It was wrong but I adopted a similar tone to the one I’d just used in our scene and doing that while he was in a submissive mindset may have gotten me more compliance than it would likely have otherwise.
He blew out a sigh. “Well, it was this huge thing about a month ago. Where the professor was giving Mira… some help.” His eyes shifted and I knew he was trying not to break someone’s trust—her trust. “With stress.” He took a drink of the Coke. “For some heavy stuff.”
“I know about her mother, Silas. I work in the emergency department at the hospital in Butte. I’ve taken care of Mira’s mother there in the past.”
“Oh.” His shoulders dropped and his back bowed in relaxation. “Yeah, so the professor was giving her a stress-release scene, and she kind of missed Mira using her safe word…” he swallowed. “A couple of times until Mira was sort of freaking out.”
I went cold and my head snapped in the direction of the woman who’d hurt my girlie. As soon as I saw her swing the rubber paddle, I cursed. And by the time it thwacked across Mira’s pretty ass and red flared in its place, I was no longer cold. I was filled with red hot rage.
“Mira wasn’t mad, and it was dealt with by Master Derek, but I don’t know if I would be brave enough to play with her again.”
I couldn’t leave Silas after a scene, not until he was ready and obviously the protective urges in me were unfounded in that moment. Mira was clearly safe, so I sat next to Silas and gave him the attention he deserved, but as soon as he was good, I bolted out of the Dungeon.
Derek sat behind his desk, his forearms resting on its surface, his fingers steepled as he listened to Wes’ concerns.
“I understand your concern, Doctor Lake, but this has been dealt with. Mira was well taken care of by another of my staff. And after a lot of discussion, and a lot of consideration, we had an agreed upon plan for dealing with it. And it was taken care of.”
“She should have been banned,” I said, sounding much calmer than I felt.
“If it weren’t a mistake, she would have been.” Master Derek’s serious expression reassured me it was the truth. “We have a zero-tolerance policy for anyone disregarding safety protocol. But it wasn’t an intentional disregard of Mira’s safe word, it was negligence.”
I sighed, starting to pace the office. I understood that. No one was perfect. All humans made mistakes.
“Why don’t I call Professor Stahlbaum down here so you can talk with her, and Mira, too.”
My eyes found his and I didn’t even need to tell him; he read it in my look.
“Ah. She doesn’t want to see you.” He leaned back in his office chair, frowning.
I shook my head, waiting for the accusation that I was projecting something on to one of his professors, but it didn’t come.
“I watched you two before—a few years ago, your scenes, your time in and around the Ranch. You had something special. And when I saw you having dinner here not that long ago, I could see you still had it. But I also know she’s really struggling right now.
And not just over her mother’s condition, which I know you’re aware of.
She’s struggling with her identity as a submissive, and as a person. ”
“I know.” I ran a hand through my hair. “And it’s something she needs to work through on her own.”
He nodded, adjusting his Bolo tie. “I’m going to call her down here anyway. I think despite her own protests, she needs to know someone cares about her. And I’d like you to talk to Maureen as well. Hearing what happened from her will also help clear things up.”
Twenty minutes later, there was a soft knock on the door. I bolted upright from the chair I’d been waiting in before Master Derek even opened the door.
She looked nervous at first until her eyes landed on me. Then there was a flicker of fear. “Is it my mom?”
“Your mom’s fine,” I said holding a hand up.
She shook her head as if she was trying to knock her terrifying thought away. “Right. That was a stupid thought. Why would it be you informing me?”
“Mira, I called you here because Doctor Lake heard about the incident last month with Professor Stahlbaum. And he’s very concerned about you.”
“I—”
Master Derek cut her off with a hard look. “Let me finish.”
Her mouth shut with a click and her jaw tightened.
“It’s important anyone who lives and plays here at the Ranch be comfortable with what happened.
If people think we let submissives’ safe words be ignored or disregarded, no one from the community will trust us.
And I pride myself on Rawhide being a safe space.
You know we get a lot of people here looking for a safe haven after bad experiences in the outside kink community, right? ”
Mira nodded, looking a little less aggravated.
“Are you comfortable talking with me here, or would you like some privacy?” He wasn’t asking me because his obligation was to her first.
“We can go talk somewhere else.”
“No, Mira. You’re going to talk here with me just outside the door. I’m not leaving you vulnerable in a situation you aren’t fully comfortable in.”
Mira’s eyes found mine. “I trust Doctor Lake.”
“Still.” He pointed at the door and started toward it. “One holler, and I’m back in here.”
She nodded and then we both watched the door until it closed.
Before I could even open my mouth, she spoke.
“I don’t need rescuing, Wes. I’m fine. It was a slipup.” She sighed sounding a little too much like Marni. “Everyone is over it. I don’t even know how you found out.”
“You’re not fine. That woman broke a serious boundary when you were in a vulnerable state and you’re defending her?”
“We talked about it. I understand what happened and mistakes happen. People aren’t perfect and intentions matter, Wes. There was no ill intent in this situation. I’m fine.”
“Mira—”
She cut me off. “You’re just like my mother, Wes, you want to step in and take care of me because you don’t trust my judgment and that I can take care of myself.”
“No, I’m stepping in because I have your back.
You don’t have to go it alone without backup.
And you have nothing to prove, Mira. Not to me.
Not to your mom. Not to anyone. But you’re forgetting something.
Sometimes people take care of other people because they need to.
You made me think about that when you told me your observation that I needed to be needed. ”
“Master Derek?” she called and the man stepped back into the room. “Can you please tell him to leave.”
“Mira, it’s clear he cares about you.”
“I don’t need him to.” She moved, taking a step closer to Derek.
“Mira, you really got me thinking and I’m not talking about me now. I’m talking about your mom. I went to see her and—”
“What? Why the hell would you go to see my mother?”
“Did you ever consider she needed to take care of you because she was never taken care of?”
She swallowed hard.
“Your mom was alone long before she got pregnant with you, and if it weren’t for you, she might have stayed that way.
She told me you saved her.” I took a step toward her, she was as white as a sheet, and her hands were starting to shake.
Master Derek gave me a warning look, and I nodded at him, letting him know I understood I was walking a fine line.
“First, when she got pregnant and keeping you forced her mother’s hand. and second, when she held on so tightly to take care of you that it gave her more than a year of life she shouldn’t have had.”
All the anger drained from her. I saw it in the way her jaw loosened, her shoulders lowered, and her knees softened.
“I have to go.”
“Why is it so wrong that I care about you?” I yelled but she was already running from the room. I wasn’t going to go after her, but Master Derek stepped in front of me anyway, putting his hand on my shoulder.
“Let her go.”
I nodded, because no matter what, I’d give her what she needed, even if that was for me to be out of her life for good.