Contract Renewed (Contracted Book 3)

by Aya DeAniege

  Amongst the women, there is never a question as to whether something is right or wrong. It is trial by fire.

  Amongst the men, they are like lone wolves.

  Certainly, Nathaniel had been trained by Mr. Wrightworth, but that was as far as it went until years after the pair were considered mature. More than one man has abused a submissive because he hadn't been tried.

  The women will not suffer an abuser to take part in the community. Their reaction was quick and painful.

  Because fuck abusers.

  “Here,” the older handed me the crop by the end that would be used to smack another person.

  Even then, I knew that one handed a dangerous weapon to someone by the sharp end. Meaning, if one were handing a gun to another person, the barrel would be facing the one who was handing the weapon over. I took the crop and then glanced at the others on the little raised platform. They immediately shifted their attention to other things. Instead of chasing one of them, I turned my attention to the woman who had handed me the crop.

  Her name was Madonna, and she was my mentor for almost ten years.

  She stepped up to me, turning me towards the rest of the ballroom as she pressed tight against my back.

  “Men expect us to be weak, and so we are. Don't let them own you. Rich or poor, it doesn't matter. You are a mistress," she said, slipping the crop out of my hand.

  With a flick—and no warning—she smacked a rich man across the face as he tried to take my drink.

  “Is that yours?” she demanded.

  “It's just sitting there.”

  She hit him again. “That's not what I asked you. Is that yours?”

  “No.”

  Again, the crop came down. “No, what?”

  “No, ma'am, it's not mine.”

  “Be polite, or I'll find my paddle and beat you.”

  The man fled. The woman turned to me and smiled just slightly. She stepped up beside me and handed me the crop. With a hand she guided my arm, showing me how to flick it properly. Despite the fact that she was pressed tight against my back, her body moving with mine, I saw absolutely nothing sexual about it.

  She was showing me how to move by making my body move the way hers did.

  “If someone takes your toy, you smack them. And, if someone is rude, you smack them. Make your will be known. This is yours. These are your rules. This is your life. Make them bow to you," she paused and looked suddenly forward. "What do you want?”

  “Piss off,” Nathaniel said.

  “Hey,” I said sternly.

  “Not you,” Nathaniel said, though it didn't sound defensive, so much as reverent. “She's not allowed to order me about.”

  “You answer her,” I said.

  “I came to check on you,” he murmured, green eyes flickering to the woman who was still pressed against my back. There was a hesitance. I felt as if he wanted to ask something as his eyes shifted back to me. “I can find you a male sub to start with. Michie still has no mistress and could use some attention, for example.”

  Our time a month previous wasn't a one-time thing, but I knew that he wanted me to be more comfortable as a Domme before I played with him like that. Michie was the go-to sub for everyone except for Mr. Wrightworth. He was a safe bet for Doms to play with and agreed to most who approached him, so long as he wasn't in a relationship at the time.

  I looked at the woman behind me. She frowned at Nathaniel, which made me turn my attention back to the man, wondering why she was frowning.

  Nathaniel swallowed and focused on the crop.

  “Drop the crop,” the woman whispered.

  I lowered the crop, making certain it was pointing towards my feet. "I'm not certain how I feel about Michie. He's kind of just... I mean, he's there, but he's..."

  “A masochist," Nathaniel filled in. "I suggest it only because, while we crave that control, some find it difficult to bring down the first strike. He at least would enjoy any attention you gave him. He would love the pain you gave him because you misjudged a strike."

  “I don't think I fit with Michie,” I said.

  “Fair enough,” Nathaniel said, then turned his attention to the woman at my back. “Michie does need attention.”

  “Oh, I'd love to,” she purred out. “Would it help you to watch?”

  It took me far too long to realize that she was speaking to me. When it finally clued in, I stiffened and stared at her.

  “I... I dunno...”

  “She's still relatively new,” Nathaniel murmured. “How long can you stay?”

  “As long as is necessary to settle little Michie down again.”

  “I should warn you, he's not a little,” Nathaniel said quickly.

  She let out a half-laugh. “All men are little in some manner. Will tomorrow morning work for you?”

  “He can be here within the hour, if necessary," Nathaniel said. "I don't want her being a voyeur. However, I will bow to your discretion."

  “She will attend, you will see to it.”

  “As you wish.”

  “You will tell him.”

  Nathaniel almost smiled, but a hand reached up, wiping away the smile. His eyes narrowed ever so slightly as he looked at the woman behind me.

  “As you wish.”

  Nathaniel walked away, leaving me with the Dommes.

  “Tell who?” I asked her.

  “Tell Oberon,” she responded, pulling away just slightly. “He owns us, after all. One of us staying behind must be explained.”

  “But you're dominant.”

  “To all but Oberon,” she said. “He saved many of us, is the only reason we are where we are. He asks nothing of us besides us accounting for where we are and when.”

  “Then why does it matter if Nathaniel tells Oberon where you are?”

  “It doesn't matter to Oberon. It matters to me. You see how he didn't question me?"

  “But he found it amusing,” I said.

  The woman stiffened behind me. "If your sub does that, you need to discipline him. He shouldn't find it amusing to follow your commands. There should be nothing but obedience. Anything else is disrespectful."

  “I don't think I understand that.”

  “If you grinned at Nathaniel when he told you to do something, and he was serious about it, what do you suppose his reaction would be?"

  “Ah,” I said, at least that I understood. “He'd probably beat me until I begged him to stop.” I considered for a moment, then huffed out a breath. “Then he'd probably fuck me for fun.”

  “So...” the woman said slowly. “Tomorrow morning I'll show you how to handle a trained sub, Michie would be a good example for you. Then we will invite Nate to participate.”

  “I don't think he'd go for that,” I said.

  “Then why is he hiding behind Mr. Wrightworth as he continues to glance this way?” she asked, arching an eyebrow at me.

  I glanced towards Nathaniel, then turned my back on him and focused my entire attention on the woman.

  “What are you, Madame? Ma'am?”

  “Lady," she said, then smiled slowly. "Not the prissy kind from the books, but like a rich lady, not one to be trifled with. I don't like Madame, that used to be the title for a woman who was once a whore but then took on owning whores when she became too old to continue with her trade. At least, that's the image it paints for me. Ma'am feels more southern comfort, soft on all sides. It sounds like a man should be grinning at me in a tank-top as he's wiping sweat from his sun tanned brow."

  “I could use a man like that,” I said.

  “Do you read romance books, Miss Martin?” she countered.

  “Some,” I said with a shrug. “I was joking, honestly.”

  “You weren't joking. Any woman with a heartbeat would love a sun tanned man grinning at them as he wiped sweat from his brow—as long as it's not done in a creepy manner.”

  “I get catcalled by construction workers,” another Domme said in a snide tone.

  “Feminist,” the old
er Domme said with a shrug.

  “Uh, unwanted words are unwanted words,” I said.

  “True, but I was with her when those so called catcalls happened. They wanted a date, a paid for date. They knew what we did and were trying to set up an appointment. He also wasn't calling to her. He's my regular. You should never take just one flippant remark as an evil of a specific body of peoples. You should get the whole story. Otherwise, the entire world will think we're... well... that."

  She looked over my shoulder to Mr. Wrightworth and Nathaniel. I turned my attention back as Nathaniel handed Mr. Wrightworth a crop. The Master may have tried to pretend to be new, but there was an obvious familiarity with the weapon as he flicked it out and caught a rich woman firmly on the backside. She leaped a foot into the air, screeching as she did so.

  “There's nothing specifically wrong with those two, although they remain apart from the rest of us. But their kind is not welcome in the light of vanilla.”

  “Sadists?” I asked.

  “Survivors of abuse,” she murmured. “There aren't many in the community, but once you know who they are, you can spot them from a mile away. I'm a trained psychologist, so I can spot more than most, I admit. The ones in the community who take on the roles of Dom and have survived that sort of terror are not always stable. One day, causing pain on a willing victim won't be enough for him. Then what?”

  “Nathaniel would never do that,” I said.

  “I wasn't talking about dear Nate.”

  Mr. Wrightworth glanced over at us, smiling just slightly at me before he turned his attention back to the rich woman as Nathaniel took the crop gently from him.

  Nathaniel made a great show of swinging the crop gently, this way and that, apparently explaining its use. He turned to the woman and made a gesture that was asking permission. The woman blushed, but turned away and bent slightly when Nathaniel asked her to.

  Nathaniel responded by delivering a swift smack. The woman jumped, though not as much as before. He asked the woman a question, and she said something in response, to which Nathaniel gave another smack to the other side of her bottom and chuckled at the shuddering reaction.

  “Hey!" I real before I realized what I was doing.

  “Go stake your claim before the other rich ladies think they have a chance,” the older Domme said quickly.

  I marched towards Nathaniel, not caring that there was nothing fluid about anything that I did. It as not lady-like in the least, it was more like what one might expect from a poor person who worked in construction.

  Fuck it. I was a poor person who worked in construction most of my life. Even before I could legally work, I was taking the illegal jobs alongside my brothers.

  “No, Izzy,” Nathaniel said, the cropped jabbing towards me.

  “You just—” I started.

  “And you don't flip out because someone else enjoyed something that you enjoy,” Nathaniel said sternly.

  He was defending a possible member of the community above me

  because Nathaniel knew my boundaries. He knew that I would be angry now, but I would have time to explain later, he would have a chance to explain later. Right then, however, I just wanted to beat the bitch who had shuddered under the ministrations of my man.

  “I don't like watching you do that to other people.”

  “Watching can be helpful, can it not?” Mr. Wrightworth asked, barely remembering to turn it into a question as he turned to Nathaniel.

  Nathaniel's green eyes were pinpricks as the rich lady protested. His cold eyes studied me for a long time before they flickered to the woman.

  “It's not because she's rich,” he purred out. “Or because I smacked her, I've struck several people tonight. A few have reacted like that. What have the Dommes been saying to you, to suddenly make you jealous?”

  “I don't care about that,” I said.

  “Oh,” Mr. Wrightworth said, the word drawing out as he stepped back and away from me.

  “Oh, what?" Nathaniel asked. "All I did was—oh."

  The man blushed as he looked down, considering the crop. He stared down for far too long before he straightened and looked at me.

  “I apologize, Darling,” he said.

  “You better be!” I snapped. “You want to give people smacks, that's fine, but you said you never met anyone else like that, so don't be throwing it about like it's a willy-nilly thing.”

  “Of course, I'm sorry,” he said, handing Mr. Wrightworth the crop. “Come here.”

  “No.”

  “Darling,” he said with an edge to his voice.

  Grumpily, I slipped into his arms. Nathaniel hugged me tight, then kissed my forehead. He held me for another moment, then turned me, but held me close against his body.

  “As you know," he murmured to the woman, "this is my sub, I call her Darling. Unwittingly, I've done something to you which I told her I hadn't encountered in anyone else before. And honest to goodness, Darling, I've never met anyone who needed things evened out before."

  “Is that what that's called?” the woman asked.

  “A smack to one side, but then nothing feels balanced until you receive a strike to the other side," I said grumpily when Mr. Wrightworth poked me with the crop by 'accident.' "If you only get smacked on one side, and it's not balanced out, it starts to almost hurt, here"—I motioned to the centre of my chest, aware that a man or two had stopped to watch what appeared to be me stroking my chest—"and it won't stop until it's made even."

  “Oh my,” the woman said, producing a fan from somewhere as she began fanning herself. “And it doesn't have to be as hard as he struck me?”

  “Goodness no,” Nathaniel said. “Darling, we may have found a sub. Tell her what you've been told about Doms.”

  “Consent is everything, without consent, he's not allowed to do anything to you.”

  “Or her," Mr. Wrightworth said. "There are some Dommes over there. I'd pay to see them break you in."

  “You'd pay to see anyone broken in,” I snarled.

  “And?” Nathaniel asked.

  “And you give them limits. They aren't allowed to go beyond those limits, but at the same time, they'll give you limits and commands. Like, if Nathaniel tells me I have to speak, then I have to speak. At functions like this, he can also remove my ability to speak. If I disobey, I am disciplined and disciplining doesn't exactly reside within limits, because it's supposed to teach you what not to do."

  “Most Doms are leaning towards discipline within limits,” Nathaniel said. “Darling is saying that because one day when she didn't speak when I wanted to, I gagged and beat her. She doesn't like gags, do you?”

  “Hate gags.”

  “Yet it only took once,” Nathaniel said.

  “What if the Dom ignores my limits?” the woman asked.

  “The community has several that it refers to as sadists,” I said. “I'm not overly familiar with the rules, because of my history recently and all that has happened. But it seems like when you become a Dom, you sign over the rights to have limits when you take on a sub. If you cross the sub's lines, then the other Doms will hand you over to the sadists. Who enjoy both consenting and non-consenting victims.”

  “But surely the Dom can simply walk away.”

  “They would be outcast from the community," Nathaniel said. "We believe that sometimes we cross lines, it happens, we are human after all. No Dom is perfect, but the punishment must happen, and it must suit the crime. Yes, I have the right not to submit to punishment, but were I to choose that, I would be ostracized."

  “Sounds manipulative.”

  “It does depend on the crime,” I said.

  “No, it doesn't. A slap on the wrist, or beaten a sub, the punishment must be served. In some cases, the punishment is turning oneself into the authorities."

  “Was your father ostracized?” the woman asked.

  Nathaniel sucked in a breath, there was the briefest moment when I thought he would deny, that was what we were supposed t
o do about the trial, after all.

  “The community came together upon tales of my father," Nathaniel said. "We wanted to avoid creating a beast like him, and amongst the community, many such beasts hunted and preyed upon the unwitting subs. There has been a name, or two, that we pushed in the direction of the authorities, helping to stop a madman before he got any further into his evolution.

  “If we had ever thought that my father had evolved? We would have killed him. The trial gives him a way out, but to do that to women? To poor women? He wasn't a Dom of any sort. He preys upon those who are weaker than he is physically, on those who cannot fight back and that is disgusting."

  “Are you trying to tell me that she can fight back against you?” the woman asked.

  “I've had to assign her a new trainer because the last man to try her is afraid that if he tries to touch her again, she will rip his balls from between his legs and shove them so far down his throat that they are practically back where they belong."

  “That's a little graphic,” the woman said.

  “No,” I said with a nod. “That's what I said.”

  “Tell her,” Nathaniel said.

  “One of the requirements for Nathaniel accepting me was that I train. Partly to defend myself, but mainly for stamina. The side effect is that, yes, I am capable of defending myself."

  “Most subs are pressed into training in defense," Nathaniel said. "If not by their Dom, then by those who guard the subs."

  “There are guards for the subs?” the woman asked.

  “Yes,” I said.

  I would never put such words to Nicole or Ezekiel.

  I suppose, in a way, that was what they were. Guardians of the subs. If the Doms did not demand justice, there wasn't a doubt in my mind that Nicole would simply take it, that Ezekiel—the man who made even Nicole want to serve—wouldn't hesitate to reign fire down upon the Doms.

  And they were both there, at the party. Circling, watching everything. Nathaniel hadn't just randomly invited Doms from the community. He had selected them carefully based on some criteria that he hadn't told me. Why ever not?

  I met his eyes and realized the truth.

  It's a test.

  “And in this community, you are either a sub, or you are a Dom,” the woman said.