Disciplined By The Dom (Club Volare)

by Cox, Chloe

  She didn’t know what to say. No, she didn’t know which thing to say—some small part of her was saying she should be happy to be let off the hook, that he was telling her he could never feel, never trust, never care what the hell she did. But she knew, knew, it was a lie. She’d seen him feel for others. He was brushing her cheek with utmost tenderness right now.

  “I couldn’t stand to hurt you,” he said softly.

  “Bullshit!”

  He blinked.

  “I’m calling bullshit again,” she said. “What are you doing right now? You’re being affectionate, you’re—”

  “No,” he said, and he threaded his hands through her hair and tightened his grip. “I just can’t help but want you whenever I look at you.”

  Everything stopped.

  Then a rush passed through Catie’s body, flooded into every last corner, every crevice, every nerve. Her pulse pounded out a steady, rising beat, and she was afraid to move, afraid to breathe, unsure of what she’d do.

  “That is part of what domination and submission means to me, Catie,” Jake said, his hand now moving down the length of her neck. She craned toward him helplessly, unable to stop her body from responding.

  “It’s the way I can be close to people, through that ritual, those rules and roles. It’s hard to explain. It’s the way I can bring them and myself happiness. And it just…”

  “It just is,” she finished for him. Her eyelids felt heavy, and she could feel her will weakening. But it was more than that. Something about what he’d said made sense to her on a deeper level. She thought about her own history, about her own past fighting through relationships that didn’t make sense, about holding on to people who were wrong for her, and pushing away people who were kind. She thought about how her mind relaxed into scenes with Jake. How those scenes had made her feel finally…free. Like the rules and the strictures made it safe to be herself.

  It was the only time she felt totally sure of who she was.

  “I don’t know whether it’s wise for you to continue training with me,” Jake said. “For your own sake.”

  Catie’s eyes flew open. He was looking at her intently, with that same intense level of concentration he had whenever they’d…she wasn’t sure what they’d done. Had sex. Made love. But that look pushed her beyond rational thought, beyond all of her anxieties and worries about what the hell she was doing there, and before she knew it, she was speaking.

  “I need it,” she said, and his hand stiffened on her neck. “You don’t understand. It’s like that for me, too, when you’re…when you dominate me.”

  She remembered back to the first time they’d had sex, when he’d been overcome—when they’d both been overcome—in Lola’s office. How her body had been wracked by him, while inside she’d felt somehow peaceful for the first time in ages. She needed that now more than ever. She needed to lose herself in subspace, needed to lose herself in him the only way she knew how.

  Catie looked Jake in the eye. Then she fell to her knees, kneeling before him the way he’d ordered her to at Volare.

  “Please,” she said, her voice cracked. She suddenly couldn’t see a way to get through this without him. Without this. She couldn’t tell him why she needed it, but she did. “I need this, more than I can say. I need you to be… Please.”

  She looked up to find him looking down at her with those fiery eyes, his jaw set hard. Something in him shifted, something darkened. His chest rose, his shoulders broadened, and she felt his fingers on the back of her head.

  “Show me,” he ordered.

  She knew exactly what he meant. Just being on her knees in front of him in the submissive pose turned her on. But now, knowing what he wanted her to do—what he’d ordered her to do—she felt her nipples harden. She was wet already.

  She reached up, slowly, and unzipped his fly. She didn’t know why she should be so nervous, but she was. Tentatively, she freed his cock, feeling the weight of it in her hand. And then she just stared at it. She hadn’t had much opportunity to study it in any of their earlier encounters, and now she wondered how she’d taken something so intimidating. It was bigger than she thought, fuller. She could feel his eyes on her and as she let her fingers trail down its length she felt herself slip, ever so slowly, into that freedom she felt in submitting to him.

  She raised it to her lips and kissed the head.

  His fingers fanned out through her hair, and then his grip tightened. He held on, and she loved knowing that he held her there at his will. She leaned forward to draw him into her mouth and was rewarded with a rumbling groan from somewhere deep within his chest. She sucked gently on the head, moving her fingers down the shaft, wanting to feel him swell in her mouth. His hands tensed, pulling on her hair. It should have hurt. It did hurt, and she wanted him to do it again.

  She circled the base of his cock with her hand and pushed herself forward until she felt his swollen head bump against her throat. She couldn’t breathe, and she felt her eyes begin to water. She’d been overwhelmed by him in any number of ways already, but this was new. She wanted even more. She wanted him to come hot and hard in her mouth, wanted to know she’d made him lose control. She felt both powerless, her head held in his hand, and powerful, all at the same time. The need to please him had driven every other thought away.

  She laved her tongue along the underside of his shaft and took him in her mouth again, faster and deeper than before, and as her hand found a rhythm with her mouth, Jake began to thrust, driving his cock to the back of her throat. She moaned, her clit throbbing, and she could tell he was about to come. She was nearly there when he yanked her head back and away from him.

  His cock was huge and hard, wet with her saliva, a dark, red, angry color. She looked up at him, begging, wanting to finish him, not understanding. But he didn’t even give her a chance to speak.

  “Get up,” he said, his voice choked and tight, and pushed her across the room, right up to the back of the leather couch in front of the screen.

  They stared at each other for a moment, taking each other in. He loomed over her, dark and brooding, flexing his fists, breathing hard. His eyes trailed down her body, back up to her eyes, hungry. Catie knew what she wanted. She wanted him rough, she wanted him to push out every other thought. She needed the relief. And she wanted—needed—to know he couldn’t resist her. That when push came to shove, that even when his judgment told him otherwise, he would always choose her.

  For a moment, she thought he wouldn’t. For a moment, she felt sorry that she had asked that of him, as unfair as it was for her to ask anything of him, given what she was already planning to take.

  Then he raised one hand, and, with a twirl of his finger, made it very clear exactly what he wanted.

  Catie opened her eyes wide and bit her lip. She couldn’t resist one last look at his cock, even harder and darker now. Then she slowly turned around, her waist up against the back of the red leather couch.

  And waited.

  She felt his breath on her neck first, and her own breath quickened in anticipation. It seemed ages before he moved, before he touched her, and she was already feeling lightheaded by the time she felt his hand under her skirt. He ran his hand along the seam of her underwear, and followed it down until he reached his fingers between her legs. She sighed as he stroked her, the contact both pleasurable and almost painful, she was so swollen. The fabric clung to her wetness where he gripped her, and she was sure she could come just like that if he stroked her long enough.

  But then his hand was on her neck, on the muscle sliding down to her shoulder. He squeezed, and then quickly pushed her down, roughly bending her over the back of the couch. She made a sound, shortened by the pressure of the couch on her stomach, and bit her lip again, afraid that if she said anything, he’d stop. She wanted him so badly she could barely breathe.

  He pressed his leg between hers, spreading them. He took whatever time he wanted. He could surely tell how badly she wanted him, how badly she needed hi
m inside her, and still, he took his time. She was on the verge of begging.

  He pushed her skirt up above her waist, and her underwear bit into her hips as he twisted them in his fist, pulling them aside. Her legs were trembling, and she arched her back into him as he bent her even lower.

  Her pulse roared in her ears. She felt completely vulnerable. At his mercy.

  There was no more preamble, no warning. The head of his cock touched her outer lips, and then it pushed into her, slowly but relentlessly, so that she felt each thick inch. It kept coming, the slow, deliberate motion of his thrust giving her time to wonder how he’d fit. She moaned as he slowly impaled her, dropping her hands to the seat of the couch to push herself back against him. She felt stretched, full, on fire.

  Then he started to fuck her.

  He dropped his hand to the small of her back, not letting her up, and his fingers dug into her hip as he drove in and out in long, strong, punishing thrusts. She stopped trying to buck her hips back at him and gripped at the leather of the couch, holding on, while he picked up the tempo.

  “Come for me,” he growled.

  She heard herself gurgle something unintelligible and then just stopped trying to speak at all and rode the feeling that was coming over her. Her body both opened and closed at the same time, trying to draw him in, contracting around him, and finally bursting in great shuddering waves that flew down her trembling legs.

  She’d come hard, but not enough, and he wasn’t done. When her legs wouldn’t hold her anymore he pushed her forward on the back of the couch, balancing her there, and kept going, slowing the pace until she started to build with him again, until she was screaming something, not words. He drove into her with one, final thrust and she felt him come hot and hard, felt him shudder against her, and then fall, the exhausted weight of him laying on top of her, leaving them both motionless.

  It felt like a long time before he lifted himself off of her. She might have stayed on the couch like that, limp and exhausted, if he hadn’t wrapped his arm around her waist and pulled her up. He brought them both over to the couch and pulled her down on his lap. They sat like that, still and quiet, for a long time.

  Finally, he said, “I have a collar for you.”

  chapter 17

  “What the hell’s the matter with you?”

  Eileen’s voice pierced Jake’s foggy mind and dragged him back to reality. Her characteristic perceptiveness, delivered in her equally characteristic style—bluntly—put him on edge. For days, ever since Catie had come to stay with him, he’d been a useless, preoccupied mess. He was having enough trouble sorting through his own emotions, let alone Catie’s, and he didn’t think he was in the mood to have Eileen shine a harsh light on whatever uncomfortable truths lay at the root of his trouble.

  Not that he had a choice.

  “Seriously, Jakey, what’s the deal? You look terrible.”

  Eileen rummaged through her beige leather bag, her green eyes narrowed and locked on his face. He hadn’t even noticed her cab pull up, though he’d arrived a few minutes early just to give himself a chance to prepare. A few minutes during which he’d ended up thinking about the Catie situation instead.

  “Here,” Eileen said, and put a hard candy in his hand. “Get your blood sugar up. This is a good day, Jake.”

  “Thank you,” he said. He didn’t know what else to do but pop the candy in his mouth. Eileen always reminded him of who he had been when he’d first known her—a lonely, emotionally stunted little boy, grasping desperately at the facsimile of a family he found in his father and half-brother, totally ignorant of the fact that he was intruding on Eileen’s actual family. Back then she’d openly resented him for the time he’d demanded from her husband and her son. Her familiarity with him now put him on the defensive. After all, all they shared was a history best forgotten and a tragedy neither of them would ever forget. A tragedy that he was partially responsible for. And yet here she was, worrying about his blood sugar and throwing candies at him. It was confusing.

  And she’d wanted to see the building that would house the new expansion of Stephan’s House. How was he to say no?

  “This it?” she asked, looking up at the six-story brownstone. The weather had relented for at least the day, leaving the skies overcast. The clouds looked heavy, and the cold threatened snow.

  “Yes,” he said. “It’s not ready yet, I warned you. Don’t judge it too harshly.”

  “Oh, hush. Go on,” she said, gesturing up the stairs.

  He led her into the darkened building, flipping on the lights in what was once a sitting room. It would eventually be a reception area, but right now it was just a hollow shell.

  “You weren’t kidding,” she said.

  “I tried to tell you there wouldn’t be much to see.” The candy was a caramel, and it stuck to the roof of his mouth. Now he sounded like a kid, too.

  “Some of the girls told me this one would have a fancy photo lab,” she said casually.

  Jake stiffened. It would. Stephan had been passionate about photography and writing. Jake had done the research: the arts could provide a useful form of occupational therapy. It had seemed like a natural thing to do, but he hadn’t envisioned Eileen Corrigan standing in the middle of a construction site, being reminded of her dead son’s favorite things.

  Not for the first time, he didn’t know how to feel.

  “I think it can help some people,” he finally said.

  “Good,” she said firmly. “Show me what you’re gonna do.”

  He took her on a brief tour, explaining how many extra beds they’d have, how many staff members, what programs they hoped to offer. The speech had become mechanical by now, and Jake felt his mind begin to wander, as it did, back to Catie. It felt no more odd to think about her in this context than in any other, which in and of itself was odd. She left him completely unsettled. He had come to think that they would move beyond training, into yet some other uncharted territory—a thought which, for him, was nothing short of revolutionary—and then she’d worn the collar he’d given her and promptly disappeared. Not disappeared entirely, but he hadn’t seen much of her the past few days. Granted, he was busy—very busy—with Stephan’s House, and she seemed to have her own responsibilities. He knew Roman had assigned her something to do with the Valentine’s Auction, and he presumed she was very busy with her studies. Her thesis. The thesis for which he would need to do his own homework.

  But he couldn’t shake the feeling that she was avoiding him. He didn’t understand it. Everything about their interactions felt new and incomprehensible to him. He wondered if this was what it was like for normal people, all the time. Is this what it was like to become attached? To feel close? He wasn’t sure he could recommend it. And he wasn’t sure he could trust it, either.

  Just the thought that something might be happening inside him—something he couldn’t control—worried him.

  And still, his primary responsibility was to Catie. He had promised to complete her training, to help her, to discover whatever it was that tormented her, whatever it was she hid, and…well, what she did with it was her own choice. But the process of self-discovery was inseparable from the process of training, and he’d managed to make it, instead, about his own confused feelings.

  Feelings. He had them, and he didn’t recoil from her. Even when they weren’t in a scene, he felt the connection. Unlike anything else he’d ever experienced, it made him feel like he was losing his mind.

  “Earth to Jake,” Eileen said. She waved a hand in front of his face. “What is up with you?”

  “Sorry,” he mumbled.

  “Girl trouble?” she said. Eileen raised an eyebrow, but she looked pleased.

  This was the last thing he needed.

  “Of course not,” he said, perhaps too quickly.

  Yes, too quickly. Eileen gave a cunning smile. “That Catie girl I met, then?”

  He didn’t know what to say. He just stared at her, stupidly. How did women do that
?

  “You don’t bicker like that with people who don’t matter,” Eileen said confidently, patting his arm as if they were…close. “You just ignore them. Having problems?”

  What could he say? Yes, there were problems, problems of the variety he couldn’t speak about with his dead father’s widow. But it was more than that: there was a problem with this conversation, with the way that Eileen spoke to him in those confidential tones, with the fact that she was attempting to share anything with him beyond what was necessary. Jake felt the old, familiar revulsion start to creep up his spine, and his heart dropped.

  He’d had almost a vacation from it, with Catie. It was like they communicated on the same damaged frequency, something that came in under the radar, that fooled his poisoned mind, at least temporarily. When he might have otherwise felt sick at the pretense of affection, there was the D/s dynamic to channel it away. But he wasn’t cured. This was the proof. Eileen Corrigan tried to have a normal conversation with him, something that demonstrated she cared—could she, really? Was anyone that forgiving?—and here was the old reaction.

  How long until it manifested around Catie, too?

  How long until he hurt her?

  “I don’t want to talk about it,” he said finally.

  “It could do you good.”

  “No.”

  Eileen nodded. They were standing in the room that would become the photo lab, and Jake felt that the tour had come to an end. Wordlessly, he turned around and started back down the stairs.

  He held open the door for Eileen and waited. She stood still in the dark vestibule and peered up at him.

  “I want to spend the anniversary with you,” she said, her jaw set. “Go out to dinner. Try to remember nice things.”

  He was flabbergasted. For five years he’d buried himself in what work was available, read Stephan’s old letters, avoided Eileen’s letter—singular, like the telltale heart that it was—and then drunk himself to sleep watching his movies. This year, the anniversary coincided with the Volare Valentine’s Auction, and he’d thought that the festivity of the Auction might perhaps prove enough of a distraction to give him a reprieve. Not that he deserved it. But dinner with Eileen Corrigan on the anniversary of Stephan’s suicide?