by Maren Smith
“Don’t you dare panic,” Eric was saying. “Relax. Open your throat. You can still breathe if you open your throat.”
Reeve didn’t mind if she panicked a little. He liked the quiver that raced through her, the twitch in her pussy as she fought back her instincts and fear and strove instead to obey. Her efforts impressed him. This was the response of a born submissive. Every gurgling gasp and cough and clutch of her fingers as she gripped at Eric’s hips, tickled at his sadistic side. He loved the way she squeezed shut her eyes. He loved the trembling in her thighs, the squirm in her ass as he pushed his thumb inside her, reminding her that she had three holes and he was the master now of all of them. He loved her grunting cry and the minute flail of her hand as she absorbed this new sensation. He loved the sloppy drip of saliva falling off her chin as Eric pulled out far enough to allow her several ragged gasps, and then he was back in her throat again, fucking her mouth just deep enough to make her gag.
And all because Reeve had allowed it.
Her ass clenched down as he shoved his thumb deeper. He was going to own this ass, and he wanted her to know it too. He wanted her to lie awake tonight, wondering when and how it would happen, but it backfired on him. Her puss and ass clamped down on him, and it was that hot, milking quivering as she orgasmed that undid him. He rocked the bed with the force of his final thrusts, and damn if her sweet little pussy didn’t drain him.
He stumbled when he pushed back off her, but caught his balance against the mantel of the fireplace. Light from the fire reflected off his arm, catching his eye. He hadn’t realized how badly he was sweating until then. All he knew was, his heart was pounding, and so was his cock. Pleasure’s latent thrum vibrated through every tingling nerve ending. He would have loved to watch the cum come dribbling back out of her, but already Eric had shifted off the bed to take up that coveted position behind her. He reached for the condom packets… and that’s when they both realized Reeve’s mistake. He hadn’t put on a condom.
Eric paused, staring at both packets and then back over his shoulder at Reeve. Without a word, he then turned back to Sandy and the job at hand. Because Eric was a professional, who would never allow himself any kind of personal attachment to a client. Tearing open the packet with his teeth, Eric dressed himself for work and in a quick, jerk of a thrust that made Sandy cry out all over again, he was back to business.
Which pissed Reeve off for reasons he had zero interest in examining too closely. It wasn’t Eric’s fault that he’d just fucked himself. The Castle had strict regulations in place regarding sexual safety, for the guests every bit as much as themselves. The rule was: Glove up. Every time, no exceptions. This mistake had just cost him his role as Sandy’s dom for the remainder of her visit. Even worse, he’d just benched himself for the next thirty days while they waited for the first round of STD tests to come back.
Then the sixty-day tests.
And the ninety-day.
And the final round at six months, and of course, that was all dependent on whether Marshall didn’t just fire him on the spot.
He probably wouldn’t. Reeve had never made so grievous a mistake before and Marshall wasn’t unreasonable… just when it came to the safety of his guests.
Still, he probably wouldn’t get fired.
Probably.
Shit.
* * *
Reeve hadn’t had a cigarette since he’d quit the army, but he was having one now, if only because he’d been standing outside on the porch when Doug, the second shift security guard, passed by on his patrol of the grounds. Doug was on horseback tonight, dressed in his favorite Sheriff of the realm outfit and puffing more than just steam with each exhale. He was nice enough to stop when Reeve jogged out through the snow and through the trees, waving as he came out to meet him on the path. One smoke was all he bummed, but in the mood he was in, he didn’t think one would be enough.
He was right, too. Unfortunately, by the time he realized that, Doug had long since continued on his rounds. Now it was dark. The snow was lit in slivers of moonlight, making patches of deep drifts on the ground really bright in places and the shadows everywhere else really dark. The air was frigid. He had his shoes and coat on, pants too, although each time the wind blew he reconsidered his decision to ‘step out for a bit’ without a shirt. Going in now, however, he risked waking Sandy and Eric. Conversation would not be his best friend right now.
But that was exactly what he got when Eric opened the door and crept outside. He checked back behind him, then softly pulled the door shut.
“What is wrong with you?” Eric stalked the length of the porch with his eyebrows arched and his head cocked in disbelief. Snatching the cigarette from Reeve’s hand, he stole the last drag and flicked it off the porch. “Seriously, what the hell?”
Reeve surrendered, but with prickling resentment already raising his hackles. “I know, all right? I know.”
“You know?” his friend echoed. About to say more, he abruptly shut his mouth and then scrubbed his face with both hands. “Marshall’s going to have your balls. I mean, he’s going to snip them right off, scoop out the insides and sew them into a little purse with a ribbon around the top. A red ribbon. Maybe blue. And when he’s done with his nice new purse, do you know what he’s going to put in it?” Eric didn’t wait for Reeve, but answered his own pointed question with as much false cheerfulness as a whisper could convey. “A book, that’s what. He’s going to put the biggest, fattest, heaviest book in the whole of his office in the purse that used to be your balls. Can you guess the title of that book?”
Reeve opened his mouth, but Eric cut him off.
“Castle Rules and Regulations of Employment. I have it on good authority you might have read it once.” Eric threw out his hands. “You knew where the Aviary was. Hell, you knew we had an Aviary. You want to know what I know? I know that on page one of the chapter detailing the dos and don’ts of sex with guests, the number one rule—well, beneath that three-paragraph lecture on how to recognize consent—is put a fucking condom on!”
“I thought you said you didn’t read the manual.”
“An entire chapter titled ‘Sex in the Castle’?” Eric arched both eyebrows. “You’re kidding, right? I skipped ahead, but I don’t recommend it. No pop-up pictures. No ‘Dear Penthouse’ excerpts. Not even a single crude stick-figure drawing with friction fires where genitals should be. I was misled, and don’t change the subject.”
Reeve did hang his head now. “I fucked up.”
Eric scoffed, “You think?”
“I don’t need this from you. I’m going to get it in spades when I get upstairs.”
“Yeah, we are.”
“There’s no we in this,” Reeve told him gently. “This was my fuck up. I’ll take the consequences as they come.”
Again, Eric scoffed. “Like I’m going to stay if you get fired.”
“Now who’s being an idiot?” Despite the gravity of the situation, Reeve couldn’t stop his mouth from curling upward as he counted off all the important things he already knew Eric wouldn’t care about. “Medical, dental, retirement, a decent paycheck every month and all living expenses paid?”
“You forgot all the women we can beat, fuck, tie up, fuck, electrocute, set on fire, flog and, oh yeah, fuck.” Eric shrugged. “Yeah, I’m going to miss it. But I’ve got shrapnel scars on my leg, and the only reason they’re on my leg instead of in my chest is because of you.” Nodding once, his breath steaming the air, Eric made his stand. “You leave, I leave. It’s as simple as that.”
“It won’t come to that,” Reeve decided with far more confidence than he felt.
“No, it won’t, and do you know why?”
“Why?”
“Because when we get called in to have this conversation with Marshall, we’re going to give him something bigger to chew on than who did or didn’t wear a condom.”
The temperature seemed to drop even more. “What do you mean?”
“How many hours
did we spend looking for our missing reporter yesterday?” Eric smiled, but his eyes stayed hard. “Did you notice in Wardrobe how she was awful quick to turn her back and strip down? She put up all that fuss about not being a Little, yet she bought that dress, wadded it in a ball and sent it back to our room with a runner. So she could pack it up later, she said. Take it home as a memento.”
Reeve had been too occupied with securing a rental cabin to notice. Thinking back, though, he only remembered her changing clothes. Sure, she’d seemed in a hurry, but if he attributed anything to that at all, it had only been so she could shorten the length of time in which she’d be naked in front of all the Wardrobe attendants. “What are you thinking?”
Shrugging, Eric smiled again. “I think someone needs to go back to our room and take a look through her things. I want to know what she was hiding. I want to know where she’s been. If she found something she thinks she can use against us, the sooner we know about it, the faster we can turn it against her, and maybe even keep you out of trouble.”
Reeve stood frozen, rooted to the porch. “Sounds like a plan,” he managed, but the words tasted oddly ashen and his chest felt numb. He didn’t know why. It wasn’t like he was in love with Sandy, God forbid. He didn’t even like her. He’d fucked her. He’d enjoyed her. She’d surprised the hell out of him with her submissive responses and when he was with her, she had this unbelievable ability to make herself seem innocent and pure. Shit like that appealed to his dominance in ways that were hard to suppress, but that wasn’t love. It wasn’t like, and it didn’t make up for the fact that she had infiltrated his home for purposes that hit below the belt. So, watching as Eric stepped off the porch and disappeared through the crunching snow into the night wasn’t any kind of betrayal, Reeve told himself. It was self-defense.
It was justifiable.
And if he could just keep repeating that, he might come to believe it enough to get rid of the ugly worming sensation now crawling through his gut.
Chapter 11
Sandy awoke in the dark of a cabin lit only by the flames of a gas fire that had been turned down low. She was warm. She was tender, too. Her bottom felt sore in ways that were both cozy and delicious, both from behind and in between legs that ached as only muscles not accustomed to holding one man much less two could. She didn’t mind. She liked the soreness, she liked the hot sticky mess she could feel when her thighs rubbed as she stretched, and she loved the smell. The whole place reeked of hot, sweaty arousal, of her and him, and Eric too, but it was Reeve she thought about the most. The way his hands had grabbed her ass, spreading her open so far it felt as if he were about to split her in two. The way his thumb had speared her, sinking into her in the most mortifying way when nothing short of a safeword could have stopped him. Those were thoughts fit to re-awaken her sleepy sex and set her body to throbbing all over again.
She rolled onto her stomach, burying her sigh between her arms before a slight tug at her hair let her know she wasn’t the only one awake. She glanced back over her shoulder to find Reeve, propped on his pillows against the headboard. He’d been played with her hair, a realization that made butterflies soar inside her, right before they all came crashing back to earth again. Had last night changed anything? No, it hadn’t. She still had her story and the minute she got out of here, she already knew, she was going to bring a shit-storm of legal action crashing down all over this place.
Jesus. She watched his hand retreat, knowing everyone who worked here would be arrested. So would the other guests. Those who actually made it far enough through the legal system to have charges leveled against them would be hit with felonies, the type that ruined lives forever.
She knew what she’d seen. Somebody had to think of the victims in all this, and by God, she deserved this story. But that didn’t mean Reeve deserved what was going to happen him because of it, did it?
Did it matter? She couldn’t warn him; Wendy had taught her that. Plus, if she breathed one word to him and he told someone else, then she could lose everything. Including her evidence.
She felt sick. She didn’t want Reeve to go to jail. She didn’t want him ruined or registered as a sex offender for the rest of his life.
But she did want her story, and there was no way she could have them both. So, which was she going to choose?
She tried to swallow, but the lump didn’t go very far.
“Where’s Eric?” she whispered.
By way of an answer, Reeve glanced behind him. “Had a hard time sleeping,” he said softly. “Went for a walk after you fell asleep, but he’s back now.” He looked at her through hooded eyes, not smiling, a tic of muscle leaping in the hard line of his jaw.
For reasons she couldn’t name, that look made her uncomfortable. She didn’t ask what was wrong, however. She stopped herself from doing that. They had already grown too close in too short a time. If she didn’t find a way to pull herself back, put the self-preserving distance between them again, then she might as well just hand him her evidence, tell him the truth and walk away right now. It was going to kill her either way.
Besides, she wasn’t sure she wanted to know the answer lurking behind his tight jaw and faintly accusing stare. Maybe it was just another figment of her overactive imagination, anyway, because while she thought his eyes were saying one thing, his touch remained as gentle as could be when his fingertips wandered a caressing path up her arm to her shoulder.
“What are you thinking?” she whispered, laying her head back on her arms.
The lines of his mouth offered a slight shrug. “I find myself wondering if you got everything you came here for. Or is there something more you need me to give you?”
A tickle of apprehension grew inside her. “What do you mean?”
Again, his mouth shrugged. “Everybody comes here for something. Release… self-discovery… the fantasy itself. You’re halfway through your visit. I’m just wondering, did you get what you came for?”
She was reading more into his look than was there; she had to be. On the surface, it seemed such an innocent question, one deserving of an honest answer. She only saw ulterior meanings in the asker because she herself had only subversive answers to give.
“I don’t know,” she answered, cautious without trying to sound that way. “I suppose I just wanted to try something different.”
And it had been that. Everything about Reeve and the things he’d done to her had definitely been different. That she might never again experience the like after she left was something she hadn’t considered until now. She was going to miss the touch of his rough hands swatting her ass as he sank into her, leashing her to him by the lengths of her own hair, gripping her throat to help control her breaths while she choked on his best friend’s cock—she’d just gone to bed with two men at once. Never in her wildest dreams would she have dared to do something that liberating and sensual.
And submissive.
She liked getting on her knees for Reeve, but the clock was ticking. Her time was running out, and after tomorrow, if she saw Reeve again it was likely only going to be in passing, on her way in and out of court. But only if she got the evidence she needed.
Her stomach twisted. She swallowed the lump back down again. “What about you?”
“What do I get out of this? I suppose that changes from guest to guest.”
Now who was hedging to avoid blunt honesty? She rose onto her elbows again. “No, I really want to know. What did you get out of—” He stopped her before she had a chance to say ‘me’.
“I forgot to wear a condom.” He looked uncomfortable. He looked angry, too, tapping his gentle finger upon her shoulder and refusing to meet her gaze as he did it. “My last tests came up clean, so I don’t think you have anything to worry about.”
Of all the things she expected to hear him say, that was so far off the map that at first Sandy had no idea what she felt. On the one hand, oh my God… of all the things to forget. On the other… she rubbed her thighs sinuously benea
th the blankets, feeling the stickiness of him on her skin. His fluids and hers, together they felt fantastic. It was hard to be mad about that, especially now with that erotic pulse pounding its heady beat in her nethers. If Reeve would only reach for her, she’d have rolled onto her back in an instant. She’d have opened her arms and her legs, and she’d have welcomed him with all the enthusiasm of a woman who had never known this level of passion in her life.
Her breasts tingled, nipples budded into tight peaks that scraped the softness of the sheets. Her nerves hummed. She looked away, her breath catching as she covered her mouth, trying to hide the shakiness of her need so he wouldn’t know.
His answering laugh was little more than a hard breath. “I’m clean,” he said, voice deepening. He really did sound angry now. “Marshall will get you a copy of my records in the morning when he has you reassigned.”
“Reassigned?” Startled, she raised her head to look at him, but he had shoved off the headboard, scooting down and rolling over in one abrupt motion. Every inch of her wanted him to pull her into his arms and yet he was punching the pillow, jerking at the blankets, and over he went on his other side, presenting her with the broad shadows of his naked back. It felt like rejection. “I don’t understand.” Why was he rejecting her? “Wh-why—” She caught herself. “Why reassigned?”
“Don’t worry about it,” Reeve said. She couldn’t see his face, but it sounded as if he’d said it through gritted teeth.
That was code for he really was mad at her. Not the situation, not himself or anything he might have forgotten to do in the heat of a passionate moment. He was angry at her.
Her stomach sank. “What did I do?”
Another hard laugh.
The whole bed jostled when she sat up. “What did I do?” she repeated, hating how small and fragile it came out. Not like a grown woman in charge of herself and her feelings, but like the stupid little girl she had spent all day playing dress-up as. She’d have been annoyed if not for that awful sinking that was pulling at her heart now instead of just her stomach. “Tell me.”
