by Joey W. Hill
Her stomach tightened in a hard knot over his words, but then he winked at her. She relaxed a little, realizing he’d made the remark with his usual fond, big brother-style exasperation. A big brother in name only, thank goodness, which allowed her to flirt with and tease him, the way most of the staff at Club Atlantis did. His heart and soul belonged to Anwyn, but he had an out-front sexuality and dry humor that made him an irresistible target.
He also had several unusual brands, two that braceleted his wrists and one around his throat. The two on his wrists had a letter stamped in the brand, A on one wrist, D on the other. The A was easy to figure, but the D had puzzled more than one staff member. The one on the throat had a trio of what looked like tears or drops of blood, arranged in a circle. He had the same design, only larger, on his chest. That one was an unusual mix of brand and tattoo, the raised drops deep crimson, suggesting they represented blood, not tears. But Ella sometimes thought they meant both.
Though it was obvious to the staff they were signs of ownership, Gideon didn’t discuss them. As he crossed his arms over his broad chest, unconsciously emphasizing the ones on his wrists, Anwyn glanced at him. Sometimes there were pauses between them, as if they could communicate without words. This seemed to be one of those moments.
Anwyn turned her attention back to Ella. “I agree with your analysis,” she said. “There’s a reason for the term Risk Aware Consensual Kink.”
Ella wished Wolf was here to hear Anwyn echo her own sentiment, word for word. She wondered if she could get the club owner to repeat it to him. Probably not. Doms tended to cover each other’s asses so subs couldn’t get the upper hand on them. Darn it.
“Our play isn’t always safe, though we do our best to make sure it is,” Anwyn continued. “When it isn’t, there are safety nets to prevent too much harm from being done. I believe you took those precautions, and I thank you for being diligent. I agree with your suggestions to improve the next similar event. So, what’s next on our social schedule?”
Ella let out a breath, unclasping her hands that were clutching her knees. “Thank you, ma’am. Burlesque night. I think that’s going to be a lot of fun…”
She proceeded to go over the details with Anwyn, growing more enthusiastic as she left behind the nerves that had driven the first part of the discussion. Gideon was called away to check on something with Stan, leaving the two women alone to their planning.
Several times during the conversation, Ella sensed Anwyn’s gaze on her, as if the woman had something else on her mind. But one didn’t question a Mistress. If she had something to say, it wouldn’t need to be coaxed out of her. So when the meeting was concluded and Ella was headed toward the door, she wasn’t surprised that Anwyn arrested her at the threshold with a question.
“How do you feel about Wolf, Ella?”
Ella turned. The Mistress of Atlantis had her arms crossed on the desk as she leaned forward on her elbows. “Ma’am?”
“Your honest answer, as always, Ella.”
Ella tightened her grip on the notebook of event notes she had hugged to her chest. “Way too much, as usual. It’s okay. It will pass.” She attempted a smile. “You know I get too caught up in the Doms who have the really protective vibe. I’m learning to manage it so I don’t embarrass myself. And there are Masters with that vibe who already do sessions with me. I’ve got an outlet for it.”
“But they don’t capture your attention the way he does.”
“Well enough. None of the ones who are a good fit for me have offered an exclusive relationship.”
Sometimes it puzzled her. She did everything needed in the scene. Everyone went home happy. But she never went home with anyone. The couple offers she’d had just hadn’t felt…right. The Doms in question were totally okay when she politely declined, suggesting the proposition had been a nice-to-have rather than a must-have for them, too.
“I think you haven’t found the right one for yourself, and they sense that.” At Ella’s baffled expression, Anwyn’s lips curved. “You’ve never watched any of the videotaped sessions you’ve done, have you?”
“No, ma’am.” She knew other subs did, but she wasn’t one of them. She was in the moment in those scenes. Seeing them secondhand wouldn’t seem right, somehow.
“You are a delightful play partner, and an even better third-party assistant to scenes. You project the professionalism of a staff member, and the enthusiasm of a genuine submissive, performing a hundred percent for the pleasure of the guest. You obviously enjoy yourself. But you don’t get lost in it. You are always in control.”
If Anwyn had told her she was a Domme in sub’s clothing, she couldn’t have startled Ella more. “What?”
Anwyn folded her hands. She wore a bracelet with a centerpiece of glittering topaz surrounded by a quartet of teal stones. Both hues picked up her intent eye color. “It isn’t a criticism, Ella. I’m not implying you try to top from the bottom. Not at all. You project a hard-to-miss message: ‘I belong to Club Atlantis.’ I believe that’s because it’s the relationship you trust above all others. That no one has been able to match. Because I feel I am Club Atlantis, I take that for the gift it truly is.”
Anwyn’s voice had softened, flooding Ella with warmth in every corner of her heart. Setting aside the notebook, she moved around the desk, sinking to her knees at the Mistress’s feet. “Thank you,” she said.
Anwyn leaned forward, touching Ella’s bowed head, stroking her hair a moment before touching her chin, bidding Ella look up at her.
“I’ve only seen that message slip twice. On Puppy Night, when Wolf took you out of the tree. And in the Daddy Dom workshop, when he spanked you. I reviewed the tape.”
Ella’s cheeks heated, though she wasn’t sure why she was embarrassed. Not just Anwyn, but plenty other people, had seen her spanked in scenes. She did a lot of public play.
“I…I guess I hadn’t really thought about it. The message thing. But as far as Wolf goes…he’s totally out of my league, and not really interested in me like that.”
“Hmm. It’s always best not to assume too much about what a Dom thinks,” Anwyn said. “especially one like Wolf. But he has my respect and regard. As do you, Ella. You are both important to me.”
“Then that’s all I need in the world,” Ella said. And she meant it. Ignoring the treasure one had for what one thought they wanted or needed was a recipe for unhappiness. Once that lesson was learned, happiness could always be found close to home.
“That may be. But I hope that you will eventually receive far more.” Anwyn touched her face once more, then sat back. “I believe you have a ten o’clock. Unless you have anything else to tell me, I’ll let you get to it.”
“Yes, Mistress.”
She loved being in Anwyn’s presence, but Ella was relieved to slip out of the office. Despite the bolstering effect that her boss’s compliment had given her, the overall conversation had started a low-level ache below her breastbone.
As such, she didn’t linger, hurrying through the club, avoiding the areas where she might get caught up in staff conversations. She didn’t stop until she’d reached the relative sanctuary of her destination.
The two rooms on this short hallway had once been maintenance closets, until their contents had been relocated to the basement, and the closets transformed into two cozy massage rooms for guests who’d enjoy that service.
Brownie, a club staff member, was a certified massage therapist, and Ella had learned everything under her mentorship. She had over three hundred hours of experience to date, enough to earn her the second assigned space. To her delight, she’d been permitted to decorate it according to her desires.
She’d painted the walls a warm ivory, and hung small pictures on the wall in asymmetric arrangements. Ocean scenes, sensual women dancing, a bolt of lightning across a night sky. A closeup of green leaves in the woods, spattered by rain drops. Two small tables held candles, the electronic ones that put out a flickering small light, ambiance rat
her than illumination. One wall was draped with a transparent sheer that moved in slow ripples, with the help of an artfully placed tabletop fan that made a whispering breeze noise.
She could do Swedish massage, hot rocks, and deep tissue massage. She could also do sensual massage, where it incorporated sexual play.
Her ten o’clock appointment was with a man named Leroy D, who wanted “a mix.” Ella frowned. She liked to know in advance what the client specifically was anticipating so she could prepare, but sometimes reception was in a hurry and didn’t ask all the questions she would.
Brownie was folding towels when Ella entered her massage space to see if she knew more about the appointment. “I saw it,” the short, stocky woman said, before Ella could broach the subject. She wore her usual massage outfit of loose pants and a thin, soft T-shirt. The hands folding the towels were impossibly strong, thanks to her many years as a masseuse. “Don’t worry. If you need any help or he asks for anything you’re not as familiar doing, give me a yell. My next appointment isn’t until eleven. I’m working on my taxes here since my son is practicing with his rock band in our garage. I was afraid the kitchen light fixture was going to vibrate right out of the ceiling and crash down on my paperwork.”
Ella grinned. “None of that will matter when he’s earning millions of dollars and saying ‘Hi Mom’ on TV.”
“Which is why I’m here and not at home, screaming at him to stop before I decide to have an extremely late term abortion. Oh, and your ten o’clock gets the staff discount, but he said he’d pay the full amount.”
“Well, that was nice of him, but for a staff member, I’ll do it for free. Everyone here works so hard.”
“Hey, don’t show me up too badly. I need the money for Freddie Mercury’s music lessons,” Brownie said.
“Is he someone new?” Ella asked. “I don’t know a Leroy on the staff.”
Brownie gave her a bouncing eyebrow look. “Wolf. And he requested you specifically, you lucky thing.”
“What?” Ella had been smoothing the stack of towels she’d folded to help Brownie, but now she clutched the top one, creating a tent of wrinkles.
“Yeah, I was surprised. He’s never used the massage service at the club before. Thank God he wasn’t requesting a deep tissue massage, because he’s made out of iron. We’d have to tag team him to get through that.” Brownie grinned. “Not that the effort wouldn’t be worth it. There’s my accountant calling now.” She returned to her small desk and laptop, littered with paper, and sent Ella a relaxed wave as she picked up the phone. “Hey, Tom. I appreciate you calling me afterhours like this…”
Ella moved back across the hall in a fog. First Anwyn’s unsettling question, now this. She glanced down at herself. She wore a thin V-necked T-shirt much like Brownie, and a pair of snug, stretchy shorts that were high on the thigh. Her flip-flops could be kicked off. Massage work was physically demanding, and the room was kept warm since the subject was undressed, though under a warm bath sheet.
If he wanted her to wear something different, she expected he’d tell her. Forcing herself to be calm and not think too much, she checked to make sure the sheets and hot rocks were properly warm. By the time she did her supply check, she’d settled her nerves, but they jumped to attention when she heard his long, ground-eating stride in the hallway. He was such a big man, her walls vibrated as he came up the narrow hallway.
She turned toward the door, a light smile pasted on her face. He wore a gold-colored T-shirt and blue jeans. Though the shirt was untucked, she had no doubt he was wearing a belt. He’d pretty much branded that fashion accessory in her brain for the rest of her life. His shaved head gleamed in the soft light, adding shadows to the chiseled features and sparks to the silver gaze.
It slid over her, head to toe. “I need to know your boundaries,” he said, before she could say anything. “Are you a sub in here?"
With you, I'm always a sub. She didn’t say it, but she suspected it was obvious on her face, from the flicker in his eyes, the flex in his jaw. But she found her words.
“Yes, if that’s what you want. If you don’t, I’m just a massage therapist, helping you with problem areas. You can treat me the same way you’d treat a normal masseuse. Or you can treat me as both at once. It’s up to you.”
“Both sounds good.” He stepped over the threshold. In the cozy little space, he seemed even bigger. She normally maintained a respectful distance from him, which gave her room to gauge what he was wanting. In these close quarters, she had to tip her face up to look at him. Much as she’d done when he’d moved between her knees in the candle wax room.
She didn’t often look up into a Dom's face until given permission, but in this situation, she felt like he wanted her to do it. He wanted her to feel that difference in size and strength, how much bigger he was than her.
She wet her lips. “Is what I’m wearing acceptable, sir?”
“For the moment. I’d like you to lose the shorts, though. Wear just the shirt and panties. No bra.” He glanced at himself. “How about me? What do you need me to wear to do this right?”
Despite a BDSM club being less modest than other venues, she usually gave clients a little speech that Brownie had recommended, to put them at ease about their weight or any other perceived physical flaws. It went something like “There’s no need for any embarrassment or self-consciousness. During a massage, I don't see the body; I see muscles.”
There was no way she could say that to Wolf with a straight face, so she redacted that line in her head before it made it anywhere close to her lips.
“You’ve never had a massage?”
“No.”
That knowledge helped her click back into her role, pull together some of the focus that his presence had scattered so effectively. “Well, it’s up to you. Most guests prefer to be completely unclothed so there’s no impediment to the massage, but if you prefer to leave on underwear, I can work with that, no problem. I put a heated sheet over you as a cover, and I only fold it back from the area I’m working on.”
“I tend to run hot. Is having the cover a requirement?”
“Not really. You’ll be lying on a heated pad, which helps with the muscle relaxation, but I can take the heated blanket off the top entirely after a couple minutes, if you prefer that.”
“Okay, then.” He pulled off his T-shirt, the stretch of his muscled upper torso capturing her gaze and not letting it go. The arch of his body was exaggerated because, in the small space, he had to straighten his arms more than normally would be necessary, to keep from rapping her with his elbows. Her palms itched to press against the ripple of chest and abdomen muscles, the sides of his waist. All well within reach.
Just as she’d known, he was wearing a belt. When he started to unbuckle the plain silver buckle, she turned to busy herself elsewhere.
“Look at me, Ella. You have my permission.”
Treat it like a session, she thought. A session that any Dom could request from her, that she could approve or not. Though the wisdom of not engaging with him was starting to become painfully clear, she knew she wouldn’t refuse him. No matter the plea echoing in her mind, her heart.
Don’t let me get pulled so deeply into him. Don’t let me get trapped in that same lonely sea of finding everything I want there, but nothing that wants me back.
She’d turned back around to face him, but she’d closed her eyes, her hands fisted in the table sheet. His grip closed over one of them. “Ella.”
She raised her lids, stared at the expanse of his chest. It was bare, the bronze muscles limned with a gleam of dim light. He stood behind the table, but she glimpsed bare hip bone and knew he’d fully undressed. It surprised her, since she thought it should have taken more time, at least to take off his shoes and socks before he removed the jeans.
Maybe the jeans were merely pushed down to his knees, and he was attending to her state of mind before finishing, though she couldn’t imagine Wolf in such wardrobe limbo. “Yes,” she sa
id. “Sorry. If you want to lie down on the table on your back, we can get started. If you’re ready.”
Instead, he caressed her fingers with his, traced her palm. He came around the end of the table, still holding onto her. She wasn’t shy about nudity, but her gaze stayed fastened on a straight line to his chest, which came much closer as he tugged her to him. When her bare feet encountered his, she confirmed he was naked. He drew her full against him, guided her arms around his torso. He closed his arms around her, tucked her head against his chest. “Breathe, little girl,” he murmured.
His body, chest to upper thigh, was against her. Even through the clothing she’d not yet shed according to his orders, she could feel the heat of him. That scent that was uniquely Wolf—rainwater, male flesh, spice—was enhanced.
His cock was pressed against her abdomen, his thighs against hers. If she stood on her toes, she could nestle her sex against the heavy weight of his testicles, feel their pressure against her clit. She let herself be held and held him back. He’d put her hands low on his back, just above his waist. While he stroked her nape and the valley of her spine with strong hands, he played under the thick weight of her hair. She had it clipped up high on her neck.
She needed to ask him what he thought of her, why he was seeking her out like this. But maybe she didn’t really want those answers, not right now. Instead, once she’d steadied, she lifted her head to give him the effort of an easy smile. “You are so tall.”
“No. You’re just so petite. I could carry you in one hand.” He returned the smile with a faint one of his own. It made her toes curl against the inside of his feet framing hers.
“Leroy D,” she said. “Is the D your last name initial?”
“Middle name.”
“What does it stand for?”
“Something God Himself will not pry out of me.”
She smiled again, and he glanced toward the massage table. “There, you said?”
She nodded and he let her go, shifting a hip onto the table and stretching out. The cot shuddered under his weight. Moving to the end, she adjusted the extension for a seven-foot length so his heels could rest on the cushioned surface.
