by M. Q. Barber
Henry’s decision to make. Her faith in him raised no petulant, childish objections. However he handled Emma’s pain, he would bring sensitivity and skill to bear. As she would, holding her tongue while Jay inched closer and peered over her shoulder.
Shuffling the first letter to the back exposed the second envelope.
To my craven, disobedient cockslut.
With one greeting, Cal’d set the tone for the demonstration he intended to give.
Dipping into her waistband, Jay rubbed the swell of her hip. Back and forth, in time with his breathing. A stroke of security, a reminder of his present circumstances, maybe, keeping him here with her and not tumbling into memory.
She ached to crack a joke—express surprise at Cal’s ability to use the word craven, laugh at the ridiculousness of him applying my to Jay at all, or declare her cockslut solidarity and reclaim the slur with pride. But laughter, in shattering surface tension, left deeper hurts untouched.
“I cannot punish you as he did, sverchok.” Henry’s gentle baritone floated in stillness. “It’s not my place, nor is it yours any longer.”
Flipping the envelope to the back, she tipped her head against Jay’s cheek. Cal’s venom didn’t burst into flames under the office light’s yellow warmth. Pity.
You fear me, slut. I see it in your avoidance. You fear me because you know you long to submit. Your pathetic safe haven will never satisfy you. Does he make you scream, slut? Do you cry apologies and beg at his feet? Take the rest of your whipping like a good slave and someday you’ll earn back the privilege of sucking my cock. Bring your little pussy and present her to me. She might gain you a reprieve. Does she cower as well as you do? No matter. She’ll learn.
The note ended with a command to attend the demonstration Friday night. Cal’s letter to Henry had couched the demand as an invitation to “honored guests,” but the one to Jay made no attempt at pretense.
Jay, trembling, cleared his throat. “Are we going?”
If they didn’t, Cal would control the conversation. He might reestablish credibility with the club’s unattached submissives. Attending could be their chance to shut him down.
“Cal likely intends his offensive letters to prompt me to decline on our behalf.” The low murmurs had stopped, but Henry held Emma in a one-armed embrace.
In a simple gesture, Henry anchored forgiveness and apology to swallow up panicked emptiness. Emma’d gotten struck by Cal’s fangs. He’d gone around her and secured the slot through the old boys’ network. She’d returned to the unexpected and out of control.
Alice had thrashed in a similar panic at Jay’s departure, choked by uncertainty. With unrelenting questions and a well-timed flogging, Henry had driven out her fear. Emma needed a trustworthy dominant who would do the same for her. A discussion for another time.
“Not a pathetic attempt at goading you to show up?” Alice lifted the letters. The crisp, heavy paper ought to feel unpleasant, full of sweaty desperation. “He’s hitting the testosterone bottle pretty hard.”
Insecure bullshit wouldn’t work on Henry, but macho posturing matched Cal’s style. The jackass lacked Henry’s patience and subtlety for waiting, watching, and predicting outcomes. He overstepped. He would again. But the right overreach, in a public setting? Henry was right. If they gave Cal the rope, he’d hang himself.
“He’d do better to try that on a man who hasn’t the opportunity to prove his manhood whenever he desires.” Henry encompassed her and Jay both in his smile, and his green eyes held a depth defining manhood miles beyond mere bedroom antics. “But I expect he knows that, which implies he wishes to achieve the opposite.”
Jay plucked the letters from her grasp. Holding them in two hands, he read with eye-scanning absorption. He’d be fine. Fine. Henry’s love, her love, had immunized him from the venom seeping from the ink. He needed her faith, not her coddling.
“So you decline, and he taunts the crowd with your absence and waves your return letter like a white flag.” Wouldn’t that get Cal’s rocks off. Bragging how he’d bested Henry. “He’d woo them to his side by saying you were afraid to meet him on equal footing.”
Attending lent legitimacy and power to Cal’s challenge, but so did not attending.
“Precisely.” Henry maintained an even tone, but his focus strayed to Jay, who stood oblivious to anything outside the margins of the pages. “In my rejection, I would cast him as a child playacting in his father’s clothes, unworthy of dignifying with an appearance. He, in turn, would decry me as a coward.”
Rocking in silence, Jay shifted in the rhythm of a hill climb, dogged and unyielding.
Emma ceded the comfort of hiding in Henry’s arm. As she stepped away, she raised her chin and dragged a finger under each eye. “The membership would fracture, divided over how to define a master’s strength and where to cast their contempt.”
Surely Cal would have a backup plan in case they showed—hell, Henry would have half a dozen contingencies—but their presence might push him off the ledge. They should go.
Henry would never force Jay into this confrontation. He’d foster a safe atmosphere for Jay’s growth, and he’d wait patiently until Jay understood what he needed to heal and asked for it. If Jay—
“I want to go.” The letters fluttered to the floor at Jay’s feet. “I want to go.”
Yes. She held her breath.
Henry edged forward and stopped. A twitch exited his left pinky, as if he’d compressed every drop of excitement but couldn’t contain the concentrated result.
“You believe we ought to attend the demonstration?” In using his bland testing voice, Henry demanded willful choice instead of blind obedience.
“You said—” Jay ducked his head. “A long time ago—” He shook off in a full-body shudder and stilled. “You said you needed to know how I’d react, seeing Cal. If I’d panic.” Shoulders slumping, he fisted his hands and knocked them together. “And I did. Two months ago I did, and Alice stepped up like a boss, but I didn’t. I let her down.”
Bullshit. “You didn’t—”
He waved off her half-formed objection. “You say it’s fine, but it’s not fine to me. I want to be the best me. The me who submits to you both because we all want our life that way and not because I can’t do anything else.”
Fuck what their attending did or didn’t do for Cal. Jay deserved the chance to face his tormenter and shut the door on the worst point of his life. He needed to confront his fear and recognize down to the subatomic level, to every spinning quark, that Cal would never control him again.
“I want to be a strong submissive. A proud submissive.” He drowned them in his dark eyes, in rich soil nurturing new strength. “I’ve felt that way at our apartment since the first time I walked inside and knelt at Henry’s feet. And I felt it again here at the club last night, serving you both.” Squaring his shoulders, Jay raised his head. “I want to go.”
They couldn’t protect him from this.
“I am—” A gruff whisper choked Henry’s smooth, rolling baritone. “I am so very proud of you.” He reached out, and Jay crashed into his embrace. “Though this won’t be easy, you are more than man enough for the challenge. Who are you, Jay?”
“Yours.” Forearms straining across Henry’s back, Jay spoke fierce, swift, and low. “I’m your sleepy-eyed morning kisser and your sweaty-limbed afternoon showoff and your dinner-table setter and your unbreakable masterpiece. I’m Alice’s teasing sweetheart and her horny stud, her personal heating blanket and her favorite speller. I’m a million and one things, and all of them are Jay, and all of them are loved, and I won’t forget this time.”
“Our Jay.” Henry claimed him with the raw power he saved for moments when they overwhelmed his passion, an intense, dam-breaking kiss punctuated not by cracking concrete but by Jay’s urgent, eager whimpers. Henry’s gentleness crept in with comforting nips, tiny promises of a deeper claiming to come. “The unsurpassed pinnacle of Jay
, because with each choice you summit a higher peak.” Smoothing back dark hair, Henry kissed Jay’s forehead. “Thank you for taking this journey, dearest.”
“I love making you proud.” Jay snuggled in tight. “That’s Jay, too. I love knowing I’m safe, that I won’t be ridiculed or rejected. That’s the me I want to show. The confident me.”
“Do you know how we shall accomplish our goal?”
Jay shook his head. “Show up?”
Henry chuckled. “Yes, that, but we shall leave the ribbons at the desk. Let your conscience rather than my commands guide your behavior. Say all you need to. Reject him wholly however you wish.”
The longer she stayed with her men, the more her conscience sounded like Henry. Safe bet Jay’s did, too.
“No ribbons.” Jay squeaked. Wide-eyed terror streaked across his face. With hard-won determination, he narrowed his gaze and chased it off.
Beautiful. So fucking beautiful, Jay mastering his fear and choosing the hard path.
Jay nodded. To himself, to them, to his ever-shrinking insecurity. “No ribbons.”
Chapter 14
“Red, sir?” Caitlyn reached under the counter.
With a sharp slashing gesture, Henry cut the air. “No, thank you.”
The young staffer sneaked a glance at Alice. “Of course, sir. I should have remembered. Yellow?”
“No ribbons tonight.”
Despite a week of preparation, with nightly interrogations and quizzes, Henry’s words cranked her pulse. Jay had to be shaking in his skin. But he had to confront Cal without restrictions. She blessed her fidgety lover’s knuckles, one leisurely kiss at a time.
“Graduation,” Henry murmured. Damn straight. Jay’d made valedictorian, and he’d fucking ace this ceremonial sendoff. “Alice and Jay have attended the dominant ethics class twice. They won’t be granting anyone control over them this evening, Caitlyn.” As Henry tapped the counter, two hard clicks echoed off the high ceiling. His bare left wrist edged out from his cufflinked dress shirt. “Please mark them as my guests without the submissive notation in the ledger.”
Wide eyes flashing toward them, the green-ribboned girl inclined her head. “Master Jay, Mistress Alice. Please accept my apology for not greeting you upon your arrival.”
“An unintentional oversight.” At least she sounded cool and collected, for all the frenzied adrenaline pooling in her muscles. Kicking the shit out of Cal and stepping over his fetal body would’ve been her preferred opening move. “No apologies needed.”
“We’ll overlook it, of course, Caitlyn.” Jay, voice rolling naturally after hers, poured out sincere understanding. Henry’s watch glinted on his wrist. “You couldn’t have known.”
A sigh escaped the girl’s parted lips.
Alice held in a laugh. She’d sighed, too, when her men had exited the bedroom in their matching stone gray suits and Henry-green flourishes coordinated with her dress. “If you like the ties”—Jay unzipped his fly and waved his favorite green undershorts at her—“check out my extra layer of protection.” She pecked his cheek. No ribbons, but hers and Henry’s all the same.
Caitlyn pivoted at startled-bird speed. “May I render you another service, sir? Sirs? Madam?”
“No, thank you, Caitlyn.” Ushering them aside, Henry delivered a fond smile. “Your service has been carried out to perfection as usual.”
“Have an enjoyable evening, sirs, madam.” A wistful twinge lightened her tone.
Halfway up the curving staircase, Alice caught Caitlyn staring after them. “Poor girl.” As the bend led them out of sight, Alice exaggerated her sigh and squeezed Jay’s hand. The more lighthearted they started the night, the less nervous Jay would be. “You’ve given her another fantasy. Now her crush isn’t only on Henry.”
Jay snorted. “If she wants me to dominate her, she’ll have better luck with fantasies than the reality.”
Nudging his hip, she dropped into a sultry purr. “And if I want you to dominate me, sir?”
“Yes, ma’am.” Sly-voiced and straight-faced, he managed a credible Henry impersonation. “Just tell me exactly what you want me to do to you. In great detail.” He hung back a step and gazed up at her. “Then order me to do it.”
Straight faces collapsed. Her giggle spurred Jay’s smirk into full-blown laughter and converted Henry’s smile into a chuckle.
She patted Jay’s chest. “You got it, stud.”
A shared glance filled her with Henry’s pride in them. He’d been extra firm with Jay all week, demanding and challenging, and put him to sleep wrung out and relaxed nightly. Shared Jay’s shower tonight, her men’s growls and whimpers vying with the pounding water for her just-home-from-work soundtrack.
Arriving on the third floor, she schooled herself to seriousness. Greetings and introductions blurred. Henry presented her and Jay to every face he recognized in passing, and he recognized a solid eighty percent. By the time the hallway opened up into the main demonstration room, she’d offered two dozen gracious hellos in as many feet.
Jay held up beautifully, confining his fidgeting to a respectful handclasp. If his strokes across his watchband stood out to her and Henry, no one else would know.
Henry’d gotten the old-fashioned timepiece from his grandfather at his prep school graduation. Fastening the watch around Jay’s wrist, he’d shared the advice that had come with the gift. “A man of honor keeps his word, even in so small a thing as arriving on time. Truth ought to be as quick as the minute hand, trust as hard-won as the hours. When little truths grow into large trust, the satisfaction of a life well-lived is sure to follow.”
The demonstration hall teemed with players. Rows of chairs lined one side of the main platform, where the spotlight beamed down on an empty X-shaped frame. The spillover grazed a trio standing nearby.
“I see Emma.” A distraction might break Jay’s staring contest with the padded wood. “Do we know those guys with her?”
“Board members.” Henry’s dry tone added in Cal’s corner to the plain pronouncement. “Those two will expect an impressive show, particularly when they’ve granted him the night as a personal favor after Emma’s repeated refusals.”
Emma tugged her ear. The men with her laughed, one gesturing at his brow.
“Are they talking in secret code?” Maybe Emma wanted them to ride to her rescue. “Is someone stealing second base?”
Gaze straying to Jay, Henry hummed soft and low. “Talking shop, most likely. Victor scarred his ear in a single-tail accident. He always said he was lucky he hadn’t lost an eye. He insisted on safety gear for anyone he trained.”
She scanned the crowd for a non-whip-related topic. Jay hadn’t bolted, and Henry kept a subtle watch over him, but still. Cal would show up with whips soon enough. If the jackass invited Jay on stage, she’d need more than Henry’s strong arms to hold her back.
“Santa’s here, too.” Much closer than Emma, he stood chatting with a gray-haired man the size of a toothpick beside the North Pole. “We should say hello.”
Ending his staring contest with the equipment, Jay raised an instructive index finger. “Ah-ah, he’s Master William tonight, Mistress Alice.”
She claimed his arm, linking their elbows. “As you say, Master Jay.”
He giggled with her. Giving him time to acclimate had been a smart decision on Henry’s part. She offered Henry her other arm, and he gamely joined their promenade to Santa’s side.
Turning, the gray-haired stick revealed himself.
“Master Laurence.” Henry dipped his head. Protocol prevented him from greeting Will first. Courtesy, or seniority, or something else in the complex web of etiquette in play. “The board appears well-represented tonight.”
Santa William eyed her with unusual care. Not ogling, though the teardrop cutouts in her pine-dark dress left her back and stomach bare. Will’s tie made a subtle show of solidarity, its cheeky pattern of golden nautical knots resting on a deep green
background. While Henry and Master Laurence exchanged small talk, he scanned Jay with searching intensity.
He knew. His pursed lips and rounded cheeks held back a jest—she’d stake her dress on it.
“And your pets, of course.” Like a stone skimming still waters, Master Laurence skipped his gaze across them. “I see you’re traveling with both today.”
She slipped her arms free and extended her hand. “It’s a pleasure to see you again, Master Laurence.”
The old man’s stuttering eye-dance almost ruined her straight-faced determination. She clenched her tongue between her teeth.
“Ah.” The gray-haired master stiffened. “Mistress Alice.” With a quick tilt, he shifted her hand from shake to lift before grazing the back with papery lips. “An unexpected pleasure.”
Expelling a jolly laugh, Will grabbed Henry in a burly, backslapping hug. “You’ve armored up your little ones. I must say, they wear it well.” As he twinkled sea-blue eyes at her, he greeted Jay with a solid handshake. “How does your new power feel, Master Jay?”
Jay, grinning, shook his head. “It chafes a little, sir. I mean—”
Will hugged him with the manly embrace he’d given Henry. “You’re a credit to your master, Jay, in any guise.” Gruff whisper delivered, he released a blinking Jay.
Ostensibly brushing out wrinkles in his suit, Alice rubbed Jay’s back. “There you go. That’s better.”
Jay rocked to equilibrium, his gratitude tucked beneath his sheath of charm. “It’s a night for the emperor’s new clothes. Just my luck, I got stuck with real fabric.”
For now. They hadn’t discussed the night’s end, but Henry undoubtedly had plans for every outcome. In the best, Jay’s courage would be rewarded with a full weekend of heavy submission and plenty of exercise.
“Master Laurence, if I might ask—” She scuttled the question she most wanted answered, about why the board would allow Cal to present, as nosing too far, too fast, into club affairs. “What are your thoughts on proper attire? You wear such handsome vests.”
