by Joey W. Hill
While that had relieved her, his behavior had left her feeling on uncertain footing with him. Any other Dom, she might have asked straight out if everything was okay, but something held her tongue. Maybe fear that she would give him an out, which she knew was stupid, but there it was.
So for now, she settled for being quietly nearby and trying not to look at him, an exercise in self-restraint.
She did catch enough of what was happening to know Wolf had arrived early to meet Fred. Fred, full name Frederica, was a mechanic at a nearby garage. The thirty-something woman’s mechanical skills weren’t limited just to cars. When she’d discovered that, Anwyn had invited her to handle their occasional repair issues for extra cash.
The two pieces of custom equipment in the alcove drew a lot of spectators when either or both were in use. One was a bondage wheel that looked like a spider web made out of steel pipe, with a cushioned board bolted to the center and four cuffs on the outer edges that could be adjusted closer or further, depending on the height of the submissive upon it.
The other was a horizontal wooden X-cross with a holding cage as the base. Wolf had shut it down earlier in the week when he’d noticed the cross had too much wiggle in its movements.
Chantal was studying Ella with a thoughtful look. It was likely she had picked up the betrayals of body language; a slight tension to Ella’s shoulders, the tilt of her head in Wolf’s direction while they were discussing him. In a roomful of Doms, it wasn’t likely that anything was going to escape their radar.
The Mistress might or might not say anything to her about it. Ella didn’t know if that would be a good or a bad thing. When she’d had her crush on James, Chantal had been the first to tell her he wasn’t the right choice for her. Not unkindly.
Ella thought of the forty-something man with gray eyes and close-cropped brown hair, his broad shoulders, and the protective streak a mile wide. He had a striking alertness that never flagged, his prior work in law enforcement a natural fit for his club security role. He’d accepted the Club Atlantis world in a way that had raised Ella’s hopes, but Chantal had pointed out the flaws early on.
“Acceptance is not the same as active participation. Have you ever seen him seek out a scene with someone?”
He’d watched plenty when he remained at the club to do paperwork or have an afterwork drink, but Chantal believed any Dominant leanings he had were dormant. If they were ever triggered, it would be by a woman with a similar level of interest, but whose personalities and needs overlapped the far more vanilla side of his conservative personality. Ella was the deep end of the pool for someone like James.
“It’s a Daddy’s girl crush, Chantal had told her firmly. “Don’t fall too far.”
As Ella’s nimble fingers worked the muscles of Chantal’s overworked arches, Chantal let out a pleased hum, dropping her head back on her shoulders. Her black dress fit her body snugly. An ornate cross was henna tattooed between her shoulder blades, revealed by the low back. Her strappy heels lay in a tumble on the floor next to her.
“You remember the badass alpha primal that Wolf had here a couple months ago?” Lars turned a page without looking up. “Private session. A mat and a spanking bench were the only things Wolf wanted in the room with him. That bench was bolted to the floor. Word was, the alpha nearly ripped it out. Wolf still managed to take him down.”
“You said that just to tease us. I do know how to apply a Taser to testicles with maximum pain but minimal damage,” Madelyn told him.
Lars chuckled. “Have to catch me, Maddie.”
“Fate is a wondrous thing,” Chantal observed. “Wolf was referred to Anwyn by a club owner up in Colorado. He was looking for a change of scenery. Lucky us.”
It must have been a powerful referral, Ella thought, because it hadn’t taken long for Wolf to become a trusted member of the staff. But Anwyn had excellent judgment when it came to her people.
He also brought in a good income, since he had a continuous waiting list of people who wanted a session with him, and he was generous with his time. Session approval was exclusively up to the staff Dom or sub in question. Anwyn understood that sessions, even paid ones, worked better when everyone wanted to be there.
After a Dom like Wolf or a sub like Ella approved an applicant, the requester paid an after-session fee to the club, fifty percent of which went to the Dom or sub. If the client wanted actual sex to happen, and the Dom or sub was agreeable, no payment was collected, since that would break prostitution laws.
In her outside-Atlantis life, Madelyn was an attorney. Chantal was always trying to get her to take on a case where she could legally challenge why a person’s right to reproductive decisions for their own body didn’t extend to willingly offering that same body for paid sex. While she didn’t disagree, Madelyn routinely reminded Chantal, with dry humor, that she was a real estate attorney. Chantal just as routinely bounced back with brash retorts.
Branch out, bitch. I want to see a selfie of you at the Supreme Court.
Wolf had never done a public session where sex had happened. If he ever did, Ella expected Atlantis would have record attendance that night.
“So what do you think of our Wolf, Ella?” Chantal asked, her eyes half-closed.
Yeah, she’d noticed. Ella suppressed a sigh and tried not to shoot her a narrow look. Madelyn flicked a glance toward her fellow Mistress, a smile pressed between her full lips. People-study was a passion of every Dominant Ella knew. Though she was their friend, they analyzed her the way they did all submissives under their care.
What did she think? Every time her attention moved back toward him, her nipple would twinge. She wasn’t going to tell them that, though. Ella pressed her upper arm discreetly against it, containing the feeling.
“He’s not looking this way,” Madelyn said helpfully. “You can stare all you want.”
“Oh my.” Chantal’s dark green eyes went to ecstatic slits. “I’d recommend it. That will feed my personal fantasy calendar for a month.”
Ella turned around in time to see Wolf putting himself on the cross. He was barefoot, the hems of the camo pants he was wearing brushing the tops of his feet. He’d removed his socks and black work shoes, placing them out of the way. The socks were folded precisely over the toes. As he hiked himself onto the X-cross, he spread his legs to align them with the frame. The movement stretched the fabric over his groin and powerful upper thighs.
While reaching up to thread his hands through the handlebars at the top, he was directing Frederica to bind him with the straps over his legs and torso. She was having trouble. While she’d long ago overcome her initial holy shit reaction to the club’s eye-opening interior, all six foot plus of Wolf stretched out on the cross was obviously causing her some issues. She was scarlet from her neck to her hairline.
Wolf said something else quietly to her. Kindly. She offered a deprecating half chuckle, and stepped back. Then Wolf turned his head toward their small table.
“Ella.”
Her hands jerked on Chantal’s feet. He’d spoken briskly. He just needed her help, was all. Stop being an idiot.
“She’s working on Chantal’s feet,” Madelyn said quickly. “Can I assist?”
“Opportunistic bitch,” Chantal said under her breath, and Madelyn grinned at her.
Doms always seemed to fantasize about topping other Doms. Ella understood enough about the way a Master or Mistress thought that she understood the drive, but it didn’t make sense to her as a submissive. The last thing she’d ever want to see was someone topping Wolf, male or female. It wouldn’t feel like the natural order of things.
A faint look of amusement crossed Wolf’s gaze. “As much as I appreciate your ‘generosity,’ Mistress, it’s Ella I require.”
Chantal nudged Ella with her toe. “Go help him,” she said. “Try to act like you’d prefer tending my tired feet.”
Ella dimpled at her. “Giving you ease is my only desire in life, Mistress.”
Chantal rolled
her gaze toward Madelyn. “Between Lars and her, we need to line them all up for flogging. Bunch of wiseasses here.”
“The Taser idea is better,” Madelyn said. “A flogger excites them like a bunch of puppies let out to play.”
Ella moved Chantal’s feet to the seat of the chair she vacated, mindful not to drop them like a sack of potatoes and bolt to Wolf’s side. Excessive eagerness was often prized in a session. If she acted like that right now, she’d seem too much like the puppy Madelyn described. But she didn’t dally, moving efficiently to his side.
He nodded to the restraints. “I need to test that the base won’t loosen again if there’s an enthusiastic male my size on it. Strap me in tight.”
“It may end up needing nightly adjustments,” Fred noted. “Sometimes these things have to build in some give, so the parts don’t get too much stress on them. Your maintenance staff could add it to their checklist.”
“Good idea,” Wolf said.
Ella moved down to his feet to fix the leg straps over his ankles, across his shins, and just above his knees. As her fingers slid over the camo cloth, she felt the rigid power of the man beneath. With the barest shift of her gaze, she’d get a close view of the heavy fabric curving over his groin.
She imagined him stretched out on his bed, his erection hard and stiff, her mouth wet and wanting to taste. She kept her gaze lowered with effort, efficiently handling the straps, pulling them as tight as they needed to be. Then she moved to handle the upper body.
The straps across the chest required her to lean down upon him to gather up the two ends, bundle them together, adjust their length. His chest needed the maximum reach, no surprise.
The scents that clung to him brought to mind fresh mown grass on a summer morning, the humid salt air off an ocean, a fire on a winter night. It had to be some kind of cologne or aftershave, and the heat of his body gave it a richer, more erotic scent. She imagined his skin dewed with perspiration during a powerful fucking, his large hands on her backside, holding her with a bruising grip to make that deep rutting happen. Her nipple kept twinging, even as her buttock tingled, remembering the grip of his hand there.
His eyes never left her, though he was talking to Fred. Fred was back to her usual self, now that Ella had taken over this part.
It wasn’t common to have a Dom like Wolf in such a provocative position. Ella was half afraid that, once she had him bound, Chantal and Maddie might pounce on him like cats. Though she expected they’d exercise restraint, she wouldn’t be surprised if a very rich fantasy scenario was unfolding in their minds. Well, she couldn’t throw any stones on that one, could she?
She checked the straps, running her fingers under them as professionally as possible while being very aware of the resilience of his body beneath her touch. The man was built like a tank.
“Ready,” she said.
“Are you claustrophobic, Ella?”
“No sir.”
Wolf touched her chin, cupped it, brought her face up. He’d kept one arm stretched along the upper limb of the cross, his fingers wrapped around the handlebar. He wore an Army green T-shirt untucked that stretched over his chest and biceps, a good workout for the cotton fibers.
He put his thumb against her mouth. The pressure made her part her lips, and he teased the moist edge of her teeth and tongue. Staying still was difficult, but he’d tell her if she could move. His relentless expression said so.
He rarely smiled in a spontaneous, genuine way. But sometimes his eyes smiled when his mouth didn’t, and that felt real. She wished his eyes would smile now.
“Good,” he said at last. “I want you in the cage beneath this so you can see what the screws attaching the cross to the base do when I start fighting the restraints. All right?”
“Yes, sir.”
She saw the flicker in Fred’s gaze. Even if the mechanic wasn’t part of this world, watching the elements of it play out in front of her was probably like sitting in a dark theater, getting pulled into the story on stage.
Close enough to touch, even if you wouldn’t.
Ella opened the cage door, and folded herself into the space. It could accommodate a tall man in extremely cramped conditions, knees to chest. Everyone would see the crease of his ass, his balls resting against it. She had to bring her knees up, too, but she could brace her sneakers against one side, her back against the other.
When she closed the door, shutting herself in, Wolf reached down and wrapped his fingers over the bars near her shoulder.
“Okay?” he asked.
“Yes, sir.”
“Touch my hand.”
She did so, but not with the hands she had curled against her chest. Instead, she leaned forward and rested her forehead against his overlapping fingertips, then turned her head, a slow movement that brushed her temple, her cheek, against his knuckles.
She didn’t forget herself to the point she dragged her lips across his skin, but it was a close thing. “Why did you ask me if I was claustrophobic?” she asked. “You’ve seen me in enclosed spaces in sessions.”
“I don’t know if you told those Masters or Mistresses the truth. You know how to power through discomfort to please them.”
“How do you know I told you the truth?”
“Are you sassing me, Ella?”
It was such a sweet, old fashioned word, it made her toes curl. “No, sir,” she said. “Truly. I just wondered.”
His finger tapped her forehead, once. “Would you lie to me, Ella? Ever?”
No matter what tone he used, he always sounded like a Dom. Whether it was to her or Lars, Chantal or Anwyn, he spoke with a direct assurance that suggested being a Dominant was what came easiest to him. People weren’t only one thing, not ever, but she’d had yet to see any other side to him than this.
He was the only Dom on staff she could say that about. Chantal and Madelyn, even Anwyn, had different layers to who they were. With his voice alone he held her in place, telling her she would give him the truth.
He traced a deliberate line from her cheek to her mouth with his index finger, reminding her she hadn’t answered.
“No. No sir. I wouldn’t lie to you.”
“That’s what I thought.”
He flattened his palm against the bars, and she mirrored his, on the other side, not touching. He shifted so his forefinger passed that barrier, found a section of her creased palm and traced it. Because he didn’t forbid it, and because she was in a cage, where higher reasoning started to flee, leaving only the desire to feel, and touch, she let her fingers curl, grazing his.
When she wasn’t physically bound, a Master’s command would keep her still. But the more she was restrained, the more most Doms appreciated her attempts to take advantage of the smallest ability to touch.
“I’m going to pull against the frame now,” he said at last, taking his hand away. “Remember, watch the bolts above you.”
Without further delay, he threw his weight against his bonds. The force of it knocked her out of her fugue state. Not surprisingly, his struggles shook the cage, made it groan and creak in protest, the cross likewise making clanking noises against the base. She wished there was a mirror where she could see the flex and stretch of his body. The rapt expressions she saw on Lars, Chantal and Maddie’s faces said she was missing something more impressive than her imaginings, if that was possible.
He stopped. The force of his struggles had been impressive, but he didn’t sound even winded. “Anything?”
She cleared her throat and pointed for Fred, who was bent over to follow her gestures. “The bolt on this corner loosened. The others stayed in place. The platform holding the cross also seems to be shifting some.”
“Okay. Come on out.”
She pushed open the barred door and crawled forth. As she pulled herself to her feet, her fingertips briefly brushed his thigh. His glance went to her, held.
“Seems to me it needs a true test, Wolf,” Maddie called. “It’s not really genuine unless the
big animal strapped on it is being teased to mindless response. Adrenaline and all that.”
“A fair point,” Wolf said, but his gaze didn’t leave Ella. “Draw the curtain.”
The chorus of complaints from the bar area made his lips twitch and Ella smile, despite the butterflies in her stomach. She was as locked in place by his unrelenting gaze as she’d been in the cage beneath him. Wolf spoke to Fred next. “Go check on the bartender’s issue with the beer dispenser. I’ll call you back in a few moments, after I do a true stress test on this.”
“You got it.” As Fred retrieved her toolbox, Ella noted an amusing reluctance to her movements. She might not be a BDSM person, but no hetero woman in her right mind would pass up the chance to see what was about to unfold here.
Last month, a Mistress Lyda, visiting from Tampa, had come and used this piece of equipment with her two subs, one male, one female. She’d put the male on the cross part, and tucked her female in the cage beneath. As Lyda had tormented her sub, Noah, in various ways, Gen’s hand had snuck through the bars, caressed his hip. Lyda had made her hold out her hand and smacked her palm with a ruler, like a schoolteacher. Then she’d bound Gen’s hands behind her, making the cage even more confining and movement within it more awkward.
When Lyda at last freed Noah from the cross, she rewarded him by letting him drop to his knees, feed his cock to Gen through the bars. The Mistress ordered her to suck him off while Lyda fucked him with a strap on. It had been memorable.
No matter what was about to happen here, Ella suspected it might eclipse that memory entirely. Wolf’s gaze moved back up to her face. “No, don’t look down. Hold my gaze, Ella. Too much goes on in your head. A Dom can miss a whole novel if he doesn’t see your eyes. Would you give me your mouth if I demand it?”
She’d give him pretty much any part of her body, including her mouth, but he didn’t like gushy subs. She’d seen him tense up when they got too over-the-top like that. So she simply nodded. “Yes, sir.”
“Does a good sub pout when denied, or does she channel it toward a stronger response when a Dom has need of her?”
