Chapter 12
Elina
The sound of a drum breaks through the silence. No, several drums.
I turn in Asbjorn’s arms. “What is that?” It sounds like the ritualistic music at the club, only this is not coming from speakers. It’s right outside the window.
“Perfect timing. They’ve begun.”
“Begun what?”
“Shh, you’ll see.” He brushes his fingertips over my hairline, studying the braids Lea made after I had finished eating. “The braids suit you.”
“Thank you.” I touch a hand to the one over my left ear. I feel pretty. Feminine. But even more so, I feel like something is changing. Or maybe falling into place.
“Hands up,” Asbjorn guides, reaching for a pair of leather cuffs on the bed.
A swoosh of anticipation rolls through me, and my pulse thrums in time to the steady beat outside as he attaches leather cuffs to my wrists and ankles.
The excitement builds rapidly when he steers me toward the tall, wide window in a bump-out, which I remember seeing outside and thinking it must be a new addition.
“A front-row seat,” he whispers, reaching for something at the top corner.
I gasp when I see what it is.
A chain.
I glance to the other top corner, then to the floor. Four chains with open padlocks are attached to the walls, just waiting for a prisoner.
My voice thins. “Are we playing here?”
He hums warmly. “This time you guessed right. Third time’s the charm.”
Asbjorn releases the chain and reaches down to the hem of my dress. Ever so slowly, he pulls it up, toward my breasts, about to remove the only coverage.
A slow pulsing of trepidation merges with the anticipation as I stare into the courtyard.
Several people are gathered around the fire at the far end, playing on drums and now singing and chanting too.
Other people are preparing to play. A woman in a square cage is bound and blindfolded, just waiting.
Another woman is kneeling at her Dom’s feet while he puts a collar on her neck.
And two women are already strung up on the crosses.
A Dom behind one of them rolls out a long whip, steps back, and slashes it through the air.
The tip connects with her upper back, and she screams, her head dropping back and her hands clutching the chains.
With a gasp, I step back into Asbjorn, pressing myself against the solid planes of his chest. “Isn’t he supposed to warm her up?”
Asbjorn releases my dress, bunched up around my waist, and trails his knuckles down the side of my neck. “Some women enjoy severe pain. The shock and the fear.”
I instinctively tilt my head, making room for his touch. “Why?” I know about pain, but not like that. Asbjorn always warms me up first. And the fear…
Slowly, he trails his hand to the front of my neck, turning it as he goes, wrapping his palm around my throat. “For the same reasons you enjoy this.”
My breathing turns shallow, more trepidation infiltrating my system even as a warm rush of heat stirs deep in my belly.
“It’s the chemicals in the body. Your own drugs that make you high.
Adrenaline. Endorphins. The speed of your pulse.
It makes you feel alive.” He reaches his other hand up to my face and covers my mouth with his huge palm.
Two fingers come up to my nose, threatening to close my last passage of air, but just touching the edges.
For a staggering moment, he holds me there, breathing hard through my nose. And then he pinches.
“Are you afraid, Elina?” he whispers in a raspy tone as he steals my breath. My airways close, and my lungs stutter as they try to draw in air without getting any.
I nod against his hand.
He hums, and when he presses his hips against my ass, I feel the huge bulge in his pants.
I can’t help my reaction. Even though my oxygen is running low, I tilt into him, pressing my ass against his erection.
He has never fucked me, and for a while, I was okay with it.
But tonight has shifted something inside me.
I want more. That rush of belonging. Being claimed. Being part of something bigger.
My need to draw in fresh air grows more urgent, and my hands dart up to Asbjorn’s arms. Holding on. Or maybe pulling? I can’t tell. All I know is that I need to breathe.
“Give in, sweet Freja,” he whispers. “Let me decide when you get to breathe.”
I dig my fingers into his arms. I’m so damn scared, but the desire dulls the fear. The desire to submit makes me want to accept it.
But then another scream rips through the night, and fear flashes in my brain. A strike of lightning. I jerk in his arms, and a choked yelp escapes me, drawing on the last breath in my lungs.
Asbjorn immediately releases me, flips me around, and gathers me tight in his arms.
“You’re safe,” he assures, pressing tiny kisses to the top of my head. “I’ve got you, Elina. You’re safe here with me.”
I reel from the shock—the fear still beating against my rib cage.
It takes a few minutes of shuddery breaths and calm caresses before I recover. Asbjorn easily senses when I’m ready again. He knows my reactions well, and I’m more than grateful for it.
Leaning back, he cups my face between his hands. “Do you trust me?”
Without hesitation, I nod.
“This is going to be intense. You won’t be able to use your safeword some of the time. But I’ll be here all along, focused on you. I’ll know when you need me to stop. Can you trust that?”
Again, I nod. There’s no doubt. I want this. The rush and the intensity. But I do need a few reassurances first. “Are you going to whip me?” I ask, shuddering as another scream reaches above the beat of drums.
“No whips, no overwhelming pain tonight. Just the fear and the desire. The rush of being watched.” He grabs the hem of my dress again and starts pulling, slowly, giving me the time to say stop if needed.
But I don’t want him to stop. I’m nervous as hell—scared—but somehow, it only drives my desire. So I gather my nerve with a shuddery breath. “Okay.”
“Okay.” He smiles as I lift my arms, letting him pull the dress off. Then he sinks to his haunches to take my pantyhose and panties off, stripping me completely naked.
I hug my arms over my chest, feeling like everyone outside is watching. The lighting here is soft, but the night outside is dark. Anyone who looks up will be able to see that I’m naked and bound.
He rises before me, and I feel utterly small and vulnerable as I stare up at him—his towering height, powerful build, and his age that only adds to the power difference.
“Now be a good girl and turn around, so I can restrain you.” He leans down and whispers in my ear. “So Ulf can watch you.”
“Ulf?” I gasp.
Asbjorn turns me by the shoulders, and a dizzying sensation fills my brain when I see Ulf sitting on a bench close to the building, looking up. At me.
My whole body starts buzzing and quivering. “Oh God, I don’t know if I can do this.”
Asbjorn lifts one of my arms. Click. The sound of the padlock makes my eyes dart up to my trapped wrist, then down to the man below.
Ulf is close enough to one of the big fires for the light to illuminate one side of his face.
I can’t see the finer details, but I can see those eyes. I can feel them.
“I—It’s too much. Him. I don’t know. He just…” I keep staring at Ulf, ensnared, unable to put words to the way he affects me—unable to admit it. Shame tightens my stomach, and that sense of guilt resurfaces even though I remind myself of what Evelina said.
“I know you’re drawn to him. It’s okay, Elina. We’re not exclusive. That’s not saying I’m playing with anyone else. I won’t as long as I have you. But you don’t have to feel bad about your urge to submit to Ulf. It’s okay. As long as we’re all consenting.”
I glance back at him. “Are you? Is it okay for you?”
“Very much.” A wicked smile tugs at his lips. “I like using it against you.”
“Oh.”
With a hand on my cheek, he turns my head toward the window. “Now watch him and keep doing so while I mess with your head and have some fun with your body.”
My mind spins as I fall into the trap of Ulf’s gaze, and a delicious daze descends when he gives a slow nod as if to say good girl. Asbjorn lifts my other arm too. Click. My arms are locked into place. I glance up at the padlock, then back at Ulf, my nostrils flaring and my heart hammering.
Two more clicks sound as Asbjorn spreads my legs and attaches the ankle cuffs to the chains low on the wall.
“Try and see if you can get free,” he coaxes as he straightens behind me.
I give a small pull on the upper chains. “I can’t.”
“Come on, put in more effort.” He leans close, his breath fanning the shell of my ear. “Let’s see just how trapped you are.”
I give one more pull, then one at my ankles.
“Keep going,” Asbjorn coaxes with a wicked tone.
I tug harder, then writhe with the effort, earnestly trying to get free. But I can’t. The fit of the cuffs is snug, the chains unforgiving. “No. I-I can’t.”
“You should try harder?” He rakes his nails down my back, making me buck forward, away from him, but he only follows, scratching harder.
“After all, you have no idea what I’m going to do to you.
And everyone down there is occupied; no one will stop me.
Only Ulf will see, and he’ll enjoy every single moment. You’re completely at our mercy.”
“No,” I gasp as I jerk and tug, the motion and his words only lighting fire to my rising terror.
Squeezing my eyes shut, I start shaking my head.
“No,” I keep gasping. “I can’t. I—” I don’t know what to say.
I’m not even sure what it is I can’t do.
All I know is the constricting fear and the desperate urge to escape my bonds.
I start hyperventilating, and my protests go even shriller. “I’m scared,” I plead with Asbjorn. I open my eyes and glance out over the courtyard—all the people, the fire, the whips, the drums. Suddenly, it all overcomes me in a startling flood of sensory overload. “Stop, stop, stop.”
Asbjorn snatches me by the waist, pulling me flush against his chest. “Breathe,” he urges, long and deep.
Tightening his arm around me, he grabs my jaw with the other hand and guides my focus back to Ulf, whose expression is serious, a slight frown forming between his brows. As if he’s concerned for me.
“You’re okay. I’ve got you. I’ll take care of you. And Ulf is watching over you. Nothing is going to happen to you. We’ve got you.”
We. The word swirls in my muddy brain. They’re both doing this to me.
It doesn’t make sense—one man is here, one in the distance.
Yet somehow, it makes perfect sense. I remember every kiss Ulf has placed on my forehead, every look demanding my attention, and his hand on my waist today.
Small things that speak more than a hundred words.
I have no idea what this is or why. All I know is that I want it. Badly.
So I give in. I fall captive to Ulf’s stare and melt into Asbjorn’s touch.
“Are you okay?” Asbjorn asks once my breath has steadied.
“I’m okay,” I say on a long exhale.
“Good to continue?”
I nod. I have no idea what’s coming, but I know that I want it.