Chapter 5
“It looks like a vampire bedroom.”
Beside her, Cole snorted in surprise.
Mara shot him a quick glance then went back to studying the Iron Court playroom.
There were three main courtyards of playrooms in the club. The Sub Rosa court rooms looked like elegant bedrooms with all the furniture doubling as BDSM equipment, often with discreet attachment points or hidden hardware.
The Constellation court rooms could never be mistaken for bedrooms—there were no beds—and had the most technologically advanced toys and options. From custom lighting to St. Andrew’s Crosses that rotated and tilted at the touch of a button, they were the pinnacle of what a playroom could be.
The Iron Court was different. Unlike the others, the garden at the center of this court was rocks and stone, with erotic statuary instead of plants. The first time Mara saw it, the thought that popped into her head was, “This is what it would look like if Medusa was a Domme.”
The Iron Court playrooms she’d seen resembled medieval dungeons and barren torture chambers. The Iron Court room Cole had just unlocked was Victorian maximalist.
An ornate four-poster bed with carved dark-wood posts and a red brocade canopy dominated the center of the space. The walls were covered in charcoal damask. Black and crystal sconces painted everything with gold light.
A massive wingback chair in gold and tufted red leather was angled toward an equally massive black fireplace big enough to stand in. Ornate gold-framed mirrors on every wall amplified the light.
Hanging from the center of the ceiling was a wrought-iron chandelier dripping with crystals and set with faux-candle lights.
Mara slid her gaze to Cole’s leather-clad body then back to the ornate playroom.
He caught her glancing between him and the room. “What?”
“Do you have a poet shirt?” She held up one arm and made billowing gestures around it with her hand. “With the sleeves?”
He snorted, put his hand on her back, and pushed her deeper into the room.
“I told you, no role-play.” He closed the door.
“It would be thematic,” she countered.
Cole casually smacked her ass as he walked past, making her yelp in surprise. Brief and perfunctory as it was, the spank made fresh desire sing through her, though she couldn’t say if it was from having her ass smacked or the casual intimacy of the moment.
He opened a black armoire, checking the contents. Unsure what to do, Mara laced her fingers together behind her back and made a slow circuit of the room.
The chandelier wasn’t actually in the middle of the ceiling, instead centered over the open space between the foot of the massive bed and the fireplace.
The red fabric of the bed canopy was suspended over the mattress by the posts and curtained down at the head of the bed.
She was able to circle the bed, since the head wasn’t flush against the wall.
The canopy curtain hid the fact that an iron lattice was mounted to the back of the headboard and posts, a few forgotten ropes and chains dangling from it.
A glint of metal under the bedframe had her dropping to her knees. She pulled up the hanging coverlet.
The space beneath the mattress was a cage.
Mara let the cover drop and jumped to her feet, heart racing.
Cole was watching her.
Their gazes met, and she knew he could see the panic in her eyes. Would her fear excite him?
Without a word, he pulled those same leather gloves from his back pocket and started putting them on.
Her gaze was pulled back to the bed. Was the cage why they were here?
Cages were a form of restraint, and he’d originally said un-restrained, so in her mind, unrestrained play wouldn’t include cages.
A calmer voice pointed out that the logic train was entirely semantic and he probably hadn’t reached the same conclusions she had.
Cole’s head tipped as he continued to study her while tugging on the second glove.
She swallowed the start of several questions, her panic now twined with arousal. Not at the idea of being forced into a coffin-like under-bed cage but because of the way he looked at her. The way he stood tall and commanding in a room made for depraved decadence.
Cole started toward her, walk predatory.
This time when he reached out to grab her, she didn’t freeze. She fled. Instinct made her jump away from him, but given that she was right beside the bed, she jumped up and back onto the mattress. Twisting onto hands and knees, she started to scramble away.
Fingers closed around her ankle, yanking her back.
She yelped in surprise, but oddly not fear.
Being caught felt right.
She wasn’t meant to run from him; she was meant to submit to him.
Cole pulled until her hips were on the edge. A wide hand pressed down on her back, forcing her chest and face into the mattress.
Fingers delved between her legs.
Mara gasped in surprise, though she wasn’t sure why. He’d finger-fucked her against the wall the moment she entered the club, and finger-fucked her with audience participation before dinner.
Two thick, gloved fingers rubbed her clit before pressing deep into her sex. Whimpers and whines escaped her as she balled her hands in the satiny red coverlet. He thrust his fingers in and out, hard enough his knuckles ground against her labia.
With two fingers inside her sex, his thumb pressed against her anus, rubbing and teasing before forcing its way inside.
It was only the tip of his thumb, and barely penetrated, but it made her slump, the tension that had gripped her forced out of her body as he in turn forced his fingers inside two of her holes.
He pumped into her pussy several times, his thumb anchored in her ass, before lifting the hand on her back.
When she didn’t move, he slowly withdrew his fingers from her entrances. She felt cold and exposed as he walked away, but she didn’t move, not even to watch him.
She felt fuzzy and calm. Secure.
Cole hooked his hands under her and raised her to stand beside the bed, her back to his chest.
Without a word, he worked the hidden hooks at the front of her corset, freeing her breasts and then tossing the lingerie away.
Her nipples, already hard from arousal, ruched tight from exposure to the air.
Cole untied her skirt, tossing it too aside, before cupping her breasts.
Mara tipped her head back against him, eyes closed as he flicked the tips of her breasts. She was so sensitive that she could feel the seam in the gloves as he tweaked her nipples with his thumbs. One gloved thumb felt slightly wet, as if he’d cleaned it when he walked away.
“Feel better?” His voice rumbled through her.
“Better?”
“Calmer.”
“Did you…did you finger-fuck me to calm me down?”
“Yes.”
That was…insulting?
She should protest, both because it was insult and because it felt like he was weaponizing her arousal against her. She wouldn’t, because he was right. She was calmer now. And because for the first time in years, she felt unrestrained in her submission.
Unrestrained.
Maybe it had never been about his restraint, but hers. Tightly held restraint she’d built and molded to keep herself from raging and begging was now gone. Restraint forged in the cold fires of frustration and unmet need unnecessary with him.
She never allowed herself to be fully submissive, because then she could never have been hollowed out with disappointment.
Cole wouldn’t accept anything but her full submission. He’d told her that without words. Matched her submission with his dominant deeds.
Cole pinched her nipples, hard. Floating in a hazy mental space where realizations were both clear and clouded, she was taken by surprise. She jumped, grabbing his wrists.
He pinched her again tugging her nipples, then stepped back.
“Show me what’s mine.”
Slowly, she turned. “Yours?”
Cole wasn’t looking at her. He was walking toward the throne-like chair and slipping off his vest as he went.
She studied the tattoos that covered his back until he took a seat, leaning against the tufted fabric.
“Are you willingly submitting to me,” he said in that non-question way of his.
“Yes.”
“I choose what you feel and do. Pleasure. Pain.” He punctuated the last word by crooking his finger.
She dipped her chin in agreement, looking down at her stiff nipples as she walked toward him.
“That makes you mine.”
As simple as that.
He meant for now.
He meant because of the checklist game.
But he meant it.
Standing naked before him, Mara wondered what he saw—just flesh, or something more. It felt like he could see things written beneath her skin in the lining of her heart and mind.
“Lift your breasts.”
Gently she cupped them, lifting them to fully expose the underside.
He snorted. “No. By the nipple.”
Mara’s gaze jumped to his. There was neither quarter or mercy there.
Pinching her nipples, she once more lifted her breasts. She didn’t swallow the whimpers, nor did she stop. She pinched harder, pulling her nipples up until she felt the skin stretch along the underside of her breasts, and a small smile touched his lips.
“Good.” He leaned forward. “Let go.”
She released her nipples, fingers curling into fists to fight the urge to reach down and rub away the pain.
He leaned in more, studying the tips of her breasts. “Ever pierced?”
“Once. But I got sick, took them out, and they closed.”
He glanced up, frowning in concern. “Sick?”
“I had pneumonia. I had to stay in the hospital for a few days and that’s when I took them out.”
He looked at her like he genuinely cared about this long-past medical issue of hers. When she smiled reassuringly, his gaze switched to her breasts. “Loss of sensitivity?”
“No.”
“I want a taste.” He leaned back, lounging in the chair. The muscles in his chest flexed as he settled himself, the angle of his head making it so she couldn’t see exactly where he was looking.