Maddy Mine

by Maren Smith

  Eyes burning, she crawled out from under the sheet. She sat up on the side of the bed, elbows on her knees, head cradled in both hands while she wallowed in exhausted misery. Five ridiculously short days of togetherness, and already she was having trouble sleeping alone? What was she going to do two days from now, when she returned home? How was she going to face all that empty space in her apartment? Or at her dining table with its place perpetually set for one. Or her bed, a queen-sized Tempur-Pedic that for all intents may as well have been a twin-sized brick for all the rest she'd find on it now. What if breaking away was already too late? She could barely stand the thought of going home alone, to days and days of nothing but writing at her laptop and talking to the stupid Peace lily that for three years now had stubbornly refused to bloom.

  A Peace lily wasn't a person.

  Neither was a long-distance relationship. How was that even supposed to work? Would they text each other at night after work, Skype on weekends, fly out for visits once or twice a year? She didn't want to text him; she wanted to talk to him. She didn't want to look at his reflection in her nine by thirteen flat-screen monitor; she wanted to touch him and have him touch her back. She wanted to feel his fingertips wandering the slope of her spine before dipping all the way down into the valley of her buttocks. She wanted to burn under the kisses he took such careful delight in scalding her with. She wanted to feel his hand winding in her blonde hair before he closed it into an unyielding fist. She wanted to feel those hungry bites nipping at her neck, her shoulders, her buttocks and the inner slope of her arousal slickened thighs because he just couldn't stop himself from marking his territory.

  She loved it when he cupped her pussy and whispered that hot, gruff, "Mine" in her ear. She loved it when all he had to do was look at her to make her nipples stand on end, tight and aching for him. All he had to do was walk into the room and suddenly everything else ceased to exist for her, and she loved—loved—that when he did walk in and her eyes found his in turn, his gaze always hardened, as if he were zeroing in on her. A hawk on fresh prey when he hadn't eaten in days. It sent chills through her when all his attention seized on her like that, and all the strong, hard lines of him tensed that much tighter before he started walking towards her. Only it wasn't walking, not really. It was more like stalking, and…and prey, that was exactly how he made her feel when he did that, only in a good and sensual way. Like she was all he wanted, all he'd ever wanted, and now he couldn't wait to catch her back in the prison of his arms.

  A woman could die happy in that kind of prison.

  She could die happy there. Maddy stared at her feet, feeling stupid because everything that she'd said last night had felt so true at the time, but now seemed so insignificant compared with trying to live the next fifty years without him. What would be worse: making the attempt only to lose him six, twelve, or twenty-four months from now, when they both discovered she'd been right all along, or never making the attempt at all and spending the rest of her days regretting it?

  She was such a coward.

  Dominick wasn't Virgil. Was not being able to put makeup on really going to be the excuse she used to push away the one man she might—might!—be destined to stay with for the rest of her silly life?

  Shoving to her feet, Maddy stood there for a long time, staring at the bare floorboards, all the while knowing that if she knew where he was right then, she'd have gone to him. And told him… what? Her chest tightened. She was about to sink dejectedly to the edge of her bed again, when a faint scratching caught her ear.

  It was a very small room, smaller than any hotel room she'd ever been in in her life, with literally the only amenities being the bed and a tiny closet barely big enough for the most basic of bathrooms. In keeping with the bedraggled pirate theme, the décor was sparse. Bare wooden floorboards, well-patched curtains on the poured glass window, rings in the bedposts and across the head and footboards, set in such strategic locations that she couldn't help but wonder what Dominick would have done with them.

  Glowing warmth blossomed low in her belly, filling up that by now familiar hollow the way it always did when she thought of him or whenever he put his hands on her. That glowing warmth was only slightly tempered by the idea of that faint scratching originating from a mouse in the room.

  A white slip of folded paper shot under the door.

  Dominick.

  Maddy ran to the door. Snatching up the note, she fumbled at the lock with all the competence of someone who'd never encountered one before in her life. She finally got it open, but by the time she burst out into the narrow hall, each rickety floorboard seeming as if it had been salvaged from the hull of well-worn shipwreck, it wasn't Dominick that she saw descending the far staircase to the tavern below. It was Emil.

  He paused when he saw her, but he made no move to come back.

  Glancing at the folded page in her hand, that glow in her stomach growing softly cold, Maddy looked up again. She held up the note for him to see. "Dominick?"

  "No," Emil admitted after a brief hesitation. "She didn't exactly give him a chance to say his goodbyes. But I thought you should know."

  His goodbyes? Not just cold now, the entire pit of her stomach sank. Without another word, Emil left her, jogging down the stairs like, well, a man on his way to work. For a long time, Maddy stood in the empty hallway, dressed in nothing but her… she looked down—skin! Crap!—and dashed back into her room, hastily slamming the door behind her.

  Sitting on the edge of her bed, she held that slip of paper between her fingers as if it were a bomb.

  His goodbyes.

  It wasn't taped or stapled, so there was no seal to break. Unfolding the note, Maddy read it quietly. It was painfully brief:

  We regret to inform you that Master Dominick has been called away. If you require the use of another Master for the remainder of your stay, please don't hesitate to let us know.

  It was signed, Ms. Rita Moberly.

  That was it.

  Nothing more.

  And now there was nothing more for her, either. No more what ifs, or maybes, or second guessing her feelings and excuses. Dominick was gone. All the way back to Ohio, where she had never been and never had, before today, ever planned to go. After all, cow pastures and corn fields weren't exactly on Sea World's level when it came to tourist attractions, and it wasn't as though she knew anyone who lived there.

  Until now.

  Kind of a stalkerish thing to do, wasn't it? To just show up on someone's front doorstep and hope he'd actually meant it when he'd said she was important to him. Except that he hadn't actually said anything of the sort.

  He'd insinuated it. With a spanking.

  Did that even count?

  Refolding the paper, Maddy folded it in half yet again, reinforcing the crease with her fingernails as she thought. How hopeless was she, really? Hopeless enough to fly all the way to Ohio, to book a trip at the Castle, just so she could see him again? So they could finish last night's conversation, away from the magic of the Island, where it was entirely possible that either he or she or even both of them would take one good, hard look at the other and say, 'Sorry, but I'm not crazy enough to want to shoot for this.'

  She fingered the note, the cold sinking in her gut giving way to nervous butterflies. Not one or two, or ten, but seemingly hundreds of them. All of them fluttering and tangling, fluttering and tangling as she found herself wondering: She wasn't really that crazy…

  …was she?

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  Dominick sat in the back of the room, his plush office chair pushed up against the farthest possible wall while still being considered a participant in Marshall's infamous Monday Morning Meeting. In the three weeks since he'd been back at the Castle, he hadn't missed a single one. Including this one, he had now attended more in the last month than he had in all the rest of his time at the Castle. That was almost something to be proud of, except that, like in every meeting before this, he wasn't paying attention. Cellphone in
hand, he connected to the office Wi-Fi and pulled up the only internet site he'd bothered to save to his main page.

  Slumped, long legs stretched out before him, crossed at the ankles and idly tapping back and forth, he re-read Maddy's review of the Island. By now, he knew every word by heart, but he still liked to go through it. He liked looking at the pictures. It was the only thing he had apart from his memories, and they made him feel close to her.

  Not that he couldn't have emailed her. It was right there at the bottom of the page. He could have contacted her at any time. Dropping her a subtle, 'Hey, how are you?' missive, something he'd drafted more than once, but which he'd always stopped shy of sending. It was a contact he should have made way back when he'd first been sent home—in disgrace, no less—not three painfully silent weeks later. He'd been too embarrassed to do it on the plane back to the Bahamas, when heartfelt letters like that might have made a difference. Considering all the time that had passed since, anything he sent her now would be received as if she were little more than an afterthought. 'I think about you all the time,' was far more accurate. Accurate, but also desperate, and not once in all the history of letter-writing had desperation been mistaken for casual inquiry or even romance.

  "All in favor?" Marshall asked, and the chorus of resulting 'ayes' brought Dominick out of his sullen reverie. "All against?" When no one said anything, Marshall raised his voice slightly. "Are you voting, Dom?"

  Raising his head, Dominick glanced once around the room before shrugging one shoulder. "Majority rules is fine."

  "One would think you'd be more excited about it." Tapping his knuckles on the manila folder he'd just closed, Marshall announced, "We're all in, then. I'll have the lawyers start processing the paperwork in the morning. Any other business before I call it?"

  Sam raised his hand. "When am I leaving for the Island again?"

  "First thing in the morning," Marshall replied. "Dominick can drive you."

  Dominick gave them both a look, but offered no objections.

  "Good luck fixing that mess," Jackson said dryly.

  "Good luck whipping that lot into any kind of competency," Dominick muttered under his breath.

  "Seriously," Kade interjected. "Tell her I'd love to go and that I swear, on my dead aunt's favorite eyebrow, I will behave. Sand, surf, all the fresh lobster one guy could possibly eat off of Chelsea's butter and lemon juice drizzled backside; I will be a good boy."

  "Sorry," Marshall said, with a tsk and shake of his head. "Anybody but you and Dominick, she said, and she was very specific about both of those restrictions."

  With a grunt of frustration, Kade buried his head in his hands. "Some friend," he grumbled.

  "Admittedly, things were a lot friendlier before she threatened to sue the pants off our Dungeon Master."

  "Fuck her." Dominick opened his phone again. His foot tapped just a bit harder at the air. Otherwise, he was very proud of how well he hid his irritation.

  "My thoughts exactly." Setting the closed file on top of another short stack of the same, Marshall let his hands rest on the now clear space of table directly before him. "Now, again, if there's nothing else?" When no further discussion was broached, Marshall tapped the table again. "Congratulations, ladies and gentlemen, we have just become the primary investors in a pirate BDSM resort. Dismissed."

  A chorus of chair wheels rolled as the highest ranking Masters and one Mistress Hardwick left the table. Dominick started to rise, too.

  "You stay," Marshall called over the shuffling steps of everyone else filing out.

  Stifling a groan, Dominick sank back down again. Judging by that look in Marshall's steely eyes, he was about to get yelled at. Dominick put his cellphone away.

  The Master of the Masters, Marshall kept his own counsel until everyone was out of the room and the door had drifted shut. Tapping two fingers at the empty space to the right of his kingly head of the table, he beckoned Dominick closer. "Come here."

  Determined not to feel like a teenager being called to the woodshed, Dominick changed chairs. "I really don't feel like the father-son lecture you've got brewing."

  "I really don't think I should have to give you one, so…" With a lazy shrug, Marshall leaned back in his chair. "I guess we're both going to be disappointed. Sit."

  "Are you sure you wouldn't prefer I cut a switch first?"

  "Oh, I've got plenty of canes." Snapping his fingers, Marshall pointed at the table. "Sit," he repeated, even more frostily than before. "We're going to talk, like it or not."

  Dominick plopped into a still warm chair and readied himself to be thoroughly scolded. The best defense being a good offense, he attacked first. "I told you not to send me."

  It was entirely the wrong thing to say, and he knew it the moment Marshall's stony mask faltered into the first real glimmer of, initially, surprise and then annoyance that Dominick had seen in years.

  "Really?" Marshall demanded. "You're going to say that to me?"

  On top of everything else bubbling up inside him, now he felt ashamed. A soft knock at the closed conference room door saved Dominick from having to apologize. They both fell into a tense silence while Kaylee entered. She quietly exchanged the short stack of manila file folders at her husband's right hand with a single slim folder, which she set in front of Marshall. As she turned to leave again, she offered Dominick a tentative smile; one he returned with a tight nod. He'd always had a soft spot for her. He supposed he always would.

  Once the door had closed behind her, Marshall picked up the file. Without opening it, he tossed it in front of Dominick. "She asked for the name 'La Isla.'"

  "La Isla Bonita?" Dominick returned, moving his hand to avoid touching the folder. "Good song. Madonna, 1986. I sang it all day every day for three months straight, back when the single was released. Drove my parents crazy. Find someone else, because I'm not taking her."

  "Yes, you are."

  "I'm not ready."

  "Too bad. She arrived on the bus this morning, she asked for you specifically, and she is, even now, being shown to a dungeon cell."

  Dominick shifted, struggling to control his surge of annoyance just at the thought of having some submissive—any submissive; the wrong submissive—kneeling before him. Of having to put his hands on her when no matter how beautiful or plain, plump or thin she might be, all he was going to see was echoes of Maddy in every incorrect hue of her eyes or hair or the curves of her body. Just the idea of having to touch her made every fine hair on the back of Dominick's neck and arms prickle.

  "Don't push this," he warned. "You think what happened at the Island was embarrassing? Go ahead. Force this assignment on me. See what I do next." Dominick gave the file a derisive flick back across the table.

  Cool blue eyes flashing, Marshall caught it before it sailed off the other side and onto the floor. For a moment, the two men eyed one another. Old friends, co-workers, more than roommates, both had been leaders in the BDSM community for longer than the Castle had existed. But that didn't stop Marshall from glaring, nor was Dominick in any mood to back down for the sake of good old times.

  "Don't make me fire you," Marshall finally said. "I don't want to, but I will. I will in a New York nanosecond. If you need time off, take a vacation. If you can't do the job any more, retire. I'll send you your quarterly proceeds wherever you go, just the same as I did for Don. But what I won't tolerate, and what you don't get to do, is wander the halls sulking—"

  Dominick bristled. "I don't sulk."

  "You're sulking and you damn well know it! You're also taking up space, instead of pulling your fair share!" Marshall thunked his finger on the discarded file folder. "This girl asked for you by name. She asked for one twenty-minute scene. Just one, and then I'll make sure she's someone else's guest. Or, you can tell me you won't do it again and I'll fire your ass. Right here, on the spot. That's a promise."

  Eyes narrowing, Dominick almost pushed that button. The urge to erupt from his chair and storm out ran a close second,
and yet he couldn't quite make himself do that, either. He never had been a man to act without thinking. What he'd done with Tessa had come close, but even then he'd considered each action and its outcomes. Granted, he'd never considered anyone would have the sand to throw him out of the resort, but still, he had considered all the other (dare he say, reasonable?) options.

  Jaw clenching, seeming to be either regretting his ultimatum (though not for a second did Dominick believe he wouldn't carry it through) or perhaps just the circumstances that had forced him to make one, Marshall stood up. "You think I don't get it," he said, as he slid the folder back across the table. "But I do, Dom. I really do. Whatever happened over there, it was a shit deal. But you're back here now and it's time you let it go."

  "Let it go," Dominick repeated, shaking his head in disbelief before that bubbling rage of anger, never far beneath the surface of him these days, took control. He locked his jaw to keep from saying any one of a dozen bridge-burning comments and grabbed the folder off the table. Marching to the door, he slapped it open just a little too aggressively. At the receptionist's desk, Kaylee jumped, eyebrows arched and eyes wide. Bright gray eyes, not Maddy green.

  Unable to make himself leave, Dominick let the door swing softly shut again. Hand braced against the jamb, he looked at the file in his hand. "Don't do that again," he finally said.

  Standing up, Marshall waited stiffly, braced to continue the argument. "Don't do what?"

  Dominick shook his head. "You don't understand. You got your girl. How the fuck can you possibly understand?" Stabbing Marshall with one last glare, he slapped the door open again. He dropped the file on Kaylee's desk, unread. He didn't even steal a glance at her name. Not that it mattered. He was God, after all. He already knew what she wanted.