This Time

by Sierra Cartwright

  “No.” The word was breathless. He knew she’d never been with a woman. They’d talked when they first met. When she’d signed her contract, she’d placed a giant X through the words, “Willing to play with another woman.”

  “But you’d do it if I ordered you, wouldn’t you, Emily?”

  She’d do anything to be on this side of the door rather than the outside of his home, her heart breaking.

  “I didn’t hear you.”

  “Yes,” she whispered.

  “Because you’re an obedient slut?”

  Emily could barely hear above the buzzing in her head. “Yes. Because pleasing you matters to me, Master.”

  “You do not have leave to use that title of respect. You are not my slave. You had that honour, that privilege. And you casually tossed it away.”

  From the moment they’d been introduced, he’d drawn the boundaries. He was “Master.” She was “Emily” or “Slave.” Now, he was keeping a distance between them, a distance she realised she’d created. A tiny frisson of doubt danced in her stomach. “Sir?”

  “Sterling.”

  Without warning, he was across the room.

  His slap on her right ass cheek took her off balance. Before she could recover, he slapped the other side. She gasped, putting her hands down on the floor to steady herself before she fell over completely.

  Despite the pain, or, more accurately, because of it, her pussy flooded with juices.

  The third slap, between the others, delivered directly on her cunt, dropped her to her knees.

  “Position, Emily. Forgotten your training already, have you?”

  Shaking, trembling, overwhelmed, she forced herself to stand. Gulping shallow breaths of air, she grabbed her ankles.

  With a soft knock, Agnes re-entered the room.

  Mercifully, Sterling gave Agnes a few directions, allowing Emily a few moments to regain her composure.

  The intimacy of his hand on her bare skin had overwhelmed her senses. She’d never thought to experience anything so shattering again.

  “Emily, did he let other women watch you?”

  “He?” Oh. Marcus. One of the men she’d gone to in desperation. She shook her head. “No.”

  This was strange, looking at the world upside down and through the window of her own, spread legs, another woman in the room.

  “Thank you, Agnes. That will be all.”

  “Master…”

  “Yes, Agnes?”

  “May I…?”

  “Emily just had a nasty slap on her cunt. I’m afraid she’s in a bit of pain.”

  Emily nearly screamed a protest when Agnes crouched, her face buried in Emily’s crotch.

  Dear God!

  Agnes tongued Emily.

  She cried out softly.

  Despite never having been with a woman, never desiring a woman, she was getting turned-on. The long strokes soothed the burn left by Sterling’s painful spank.

  Unbelievably, an orgasm built deep in her womb. While still licking, Agnes pressed her thumb against the tightness of Emily’s anal whorl.

  Her knees trembled and she rocked backward, seeking more, her body demanding satisfaction.

  She needed this orgasm, needed Agnes’s skilled tongue.

  Almost there. Almost… She was hot. Drippy. “Ahhhh…”

  “That will be all, Agnes. Thank you.”

  The woman stilled.

  Emily ground her cunt against the softness of the woman’s mouth. “Please. Agnes! Sterling. I…”

  “Emily.” Sterling’s sharp reprimand was effective.

  Immediately, she froze. But she couldn’t stop a soft groan from escaping. She’d never had a woman between her legs, and unbelievably she was hungry for more.

  “I shall ring if we require your services further,” Sterling told Agnes.

  The servant rose, dropped a quick curtsey, then hurried from the room.

  The door closed with a quiet click.

  Emily was totally, completely alone with Sterling. He said nothing, letting the tension build.

  In the quiet of his ancient home, the sound of the clock reverberated, stretching Emily’s nerves taut.

  Quietly, so quietly she had to concentrate to even hear him, he asked, “Are you quite clear, Emily? Very, very clear you know what you’re asking for? I’m not certain you deserve a second chance. Not certain I should give you one.

  “And if you earned another opportunity, you would have no idea what I would have in store for you. You thought I’d tested you before.”

  She heard every word, considered what he said thoughtfully. By forcing her to allow Agnes to lick her, by the humiliation of trying to grind her heat against the woman’s mouth, she’d gotten a hint of what he might expect.

  “I would not be satisfied with the little you gave before,” he continued. “Your running meant you had not submitted completely. If you thought you had, you fooled yourself.” The next words were self-accusatory, “Worse, I allowed you to fool me.”

  She dug deep for the honesty she’d always denied him, the honesty she’d denied herself. “I have been unfulfilled since I left. Bereft. As if a part of me is missing.”

  “The obedient part,” he said, the words containing no sting.

  A bit sadly, she smiled.

  “If you were to stay, Emily, if I were to allow that, you could hold nothing back. No secrets. No hesitation. No prevarication.”

  “I expected you to demand no less.”

  “I want to know why, specifically, that you left. Why, when I went to London on business, I returned home the next morning to find you missing. What upset you so badly that you felt the need to leave in the middle of the night? And why did you deny me the opportunity to discuss it with you?”

  She shook her head. His voice contained a hint of….Hurt? Her master, so finely tuned with what she needed, who’d given more than she ever had, so strong, unyielding, had been hurt by her abandonment? Anger, she would have expected. Disappointment, perhaps. She might have even guessed at indifference.

  It had never occurred to her that he’d give tuppence about her disappearance. She’d had no idea he cared for her, about her, anymore than any of his other possessions. She had more to atone for than she’d realised.

  Digging even deeper now, she confessed, “I’ve asked myself that…Sterling.” The word tasted odd, and she had trouble forming her mouth around it. She wanted to call him master. She desired that bond, the security of the implied relationship. “I was afraid.”

  “I never asked for more than you could give.”

  “Physically, no,” she agreed.

  “Kneel.”

  This Time

  Chapter Three

  Two months ago, her movements were smoother. After all, she had been more practiced.

  She very nearly sighed with pleasure when she knelt. This was familiar, helped her feel more centred. Her crotch wasn’t as exposed, either. It took considerable effort to avoid gushing her gratitude, even more effort not to rush across the room, fall to her knees again, this time at his feet in gratitude. Each millimetre that he budged opened the door for her to re-enter his life. At least, please God, she hoped it did.

  “Continue.” He poured himself a drink as he regarded her from across the room. “I never required more than you could give physically.”

  “Mentally—”

  “Submission is ninety percent mental,” he agreed.

  She laughed. “Yes, it is. And the other ninety percent is emotional.”

  “That’s more than a hundred percent.” He raised a brow in that aristocratic way that highlighted her of the hundreds of differences between them. Was she a fool to think she deserved a second chance? And what if she won a second chance? What then? Would it matter? He’d tire of her soon enough and send her away. Where could this go, her a commoner, a sub?

  “Emily?”

  “That’s what it seems like, sometimes. Often.” She silenced the doubt and confessed, “The mental par
t can be…challenging. Submission is a struggle for me.” She turned her hands palm up on her thighs. “I fight my upbringing. Mum and Dad both taught me to believe in myself, that I did not need anyone to take care of me. They sent me to school in America, made sure I was exposed to all kinds of experiences.”

  “But not this one.” He rolled his drink between his palms. “A lifetime of placing someone else’s needs and wants above you own, until your master’s pleasure becomes your own.”

  “You’re right,” she said. “They would not have exposed me to this. I chose submission because I want it. I need it.”

  “And…?”

  “I sometimes ask myself why I am not at my job, why I am stripping on some man’s command, why I am denying my own impulses to go out and have a pint with my friends or have a bit of a lie in on Saturday morning instead of—” She broke off, a testament to that struggle she spoke of.

  Sterling gave no quarter. “Say it.”

  “Instead of giving myself an enema and preparing myself for Master’s pleasure.” Her gaze dropped to the beautiful Persian rug spread in front of the fireplace. Nervously, she licked her lower lip. “Knowing I am nothing but a piece of his personal property to be used or not, cherished or discarded. I can be…” She took a breath. “I can be…”

  “I will not tolerate prevarication.”

  “Fucked. Anywhere. Anytime.”

  “Yes.”

  “By anyone. Anything.”

  Her voice a bare whisper, she repeated, “Yes.” But she didn’t drop her gaze. “It’s the ninety percent that’s emotional that’s most difficult for me.”

  “Go on.”

  “What I didn’t tell you, what I’ve never told you is…” Her lips suddenly felt dry. “I wasn’t prepared for this…”

  He went to a chair, took his seat and stretched his legs out in front of him. “This?”

  “Attachment.” The word was said in a rush, before she could be a coward and change her mind. “There’s a hunger in me that demands I submit. I think about it, dream about it, obsess about it.”

  “You walked away.”

  “You told me I should.” Nearly forgetting her training, she started to lean forward. She caught herself, concentrated on her breathing. “You told me I should,” she repeated, more calmly. “If I could walk away from you, from the lifestyle, I should. You told me I’d be smart to get out.”

  “You still would be.”

  She held out her hands. “I thought I could.”

  “I have never accepted a slave back, Emily.”

  “Has one ever fled?”

  His eyes took on a distant look, and he drummed his fingers on the cherry wood arm of the chair.

  A second surprise.

  This man, her master, the man she adored above all others, was vulnerable.

  “No.” He steepled his index fingers. “You’re the first to leave.”

  “You’ve sent some away.”

  “Yes.”

  But not her . He’d wanted her. “I’m here, Sterling. On my knees. Of my own choice, wanting to serve, to please. Asking for a second chance. Begging you not to send me away.”

  “Emily—”

  “And it’s not just about submission,” she said. The words were short and shallow, forced around the sudden lump of emotion lodged in her throat. “It’s about submission to you.”

  Before she could lose her nerve, she continued, “I told you I tried to submit to another—Marcus—after I left. What I’ve never told you is that—”

  “Finger yourself.”

  She blinked. Then she followed orders.

  “Spread your legs farther apart.”

  Emily drew her fingers to her mouth and moistened them before stroking herself with long, sensual motions.

  “Are you wet?”

  She hadn’t been. But now she was. “Yes.” A simple order from him could prove to be her undoing.

  “There were others?”

  “Men? Supposed masters?” She had to concentrate in order not to groan. “Yes.”

  “How many?”

  “Three.”

  “And you shall be denied at least that many orgasms.”

  Yes! That’s what she wanted. No one understood her like he did. And he knew it. She needed to relinquish control. More, she needed to have it wrenched away. She looked up then to find him regarding her closely. “There’s a piece of me missing otherwise.”

  She continued to stroke herself. Her pussy dripped, the juices running down her thigh. The thunderhead that was her climax began to build deep, deeper in her chest. She jerked involuntarily. She was going to come. Soon.

  “Get over here, slut.”

  Her heart was a rapid staccato in her ears. Except for the devastatingly painful slaps he’d bestowed on her, he had kept a half a room’s distance from her.

  Now he was inviting her, ordering her, to his side of the parlour.

  A joy this potent could be bottled.

  On all fours, she crawled. In abject submission, she kissed his feet.

  “Hump my shoe, then, since you’re already there.” He dragged over an antique table and propped a foot on it. “Hump my shoe as if you were a naughty puppy.”

  Nothing but the best for him. His shoe was crafted of the finest leather and polished to a shine that reflected the overhead light.

  “Facing you? Or away from you?”

  “Away from me. That way you can really grind your cunt.”

  With no pride, she mounted him. Pride was something other women held onto to help them succeed. It helped them keep their chins high, kept them moving forward in a man’s world.

  But pride was an emotion Emily could no longer afford. Its cost was far too dear.

  She had to lay herself bare before him, emotionally as well as physically. Otherwise she’d spend the rest of her life alone. Pride, she’d already learned, was a lousy bed companion in the middle of another sleepless night.

  Her knees slightly bent, Emily braced her hands on the table and began to hump his shoe.

  The leather abraded her already-sore flesh.

  “I can smell you.”

  The comment sent a wave of moisture from her pussy. Sliding along his shoe became easier. But the angle…. The angle would make it impossible to climax. She needed more direct stimulation to her clit.

  Manoeuvring like an acrobat, she leaned back just a bit and used one hand to part her pussy lips. She pinched the tight little nub that was her clit. Then she abraded it with her fingernail.

  “Get your cunt on my shoe.”

  “Yes, Sir.” She moved a bit to the left, seeking the stitching on his shoe to produce more friction.

  “Are you nearing an orgasm?”

  “I think…Uhmm…”

  “Stop.”

  “Argh!” Damn the man for being serious about denying her pleasure.

  Sterling pulled his foot away, and if she’d been slightly less well-balanced, she would have fallen to the floor.

  “On your knees.” The moment she had followed instructions, he countermanded his own order. “On all fours. Now head on the floor.”

  She knew what this meant.

  He stood. “Hands linked together behind your neck.”

  Her body was nearly in convulsions from the repressed orgasm and his uncompromising demands.

  “Your last enema was…?”

  “Before I boarded the tube.”

  He dipped a finger in her pussy, but he didn’t touch her intimately. Still, she knew what was coming.

  Without warning, he shoved the moist finger into her anal hole.

  Her cry was muffled by the hardwood floor.

  “None of your other Doms buggered you then?”

  “No.”

  “I beg your pardon?”

  She lifted her face slightly. “No, they didn’t. Sir.”

  “Did you tell them you didn’t want them fucking your ass?”

  “Yes.”

  “I’m beginning to see why
being with someone other than me wasn’t to your liking, Emily. Since when does the slave get to tell her Dom what she will and will not do?”

  “She shouldn’t have that opportunity,” she said.

  “But we both know you prefer not to be used in this way.”

  “Yes.”

  He still hadn’t moved. His finger was firmly lodged between her nether cheeks. “And a true sub does not want to top her Dom. Am I correct?”

  “Yes.” She nearly gritted the next words, “You are right.”

  Abruptly, he pulled out. She moaned from the sharp pain.

  “On all fours.”

  Emily’s heart skipped its next beat in pure pleasure. She would uncomplainingly take him in any hole he wanted. But she was oh-so-grateful he wasn’t demanding she take him in her ass.

  He knew what she wanted and gave it to her. He read her, anticipated her. This man was truly her master. Even if he sent her away and never gave her a second chance, she’d always have this time.

  His next command shocked her. “Clean your mess.”

  “I beg your pardon?”

  His head cocked to one side, as if she were stupid, he said, “Lick your juices from my shoe.” He stood directly in front of her and placed his foot beneath her head.

  Abject humiliation making her eyes tear, she began to lick her essence from his shoe. He said nothing. He didn’t even dig his hands into her hair.

  Moment by moment, she got clarity.

  He was breaking her down. Things were not going to be the same as they always had been. In the half hour she’d been here, he’d already pushed past the bounds they’d explored in their six months together.

  She’d had no idea.

  “Do not feel sorry for yourself.”

  She concentrated totally on her task. Was he punishing her for running away? Testing her boundaries? Trying to make her flee again? Getting a couple of little thrills so that he’d have a little revenge before sending her away?

  “You’re thinking too hard. Get out of your own way. You were given a task. Think of that. And only that.”

  Chop wood. Carry water. Lick shoe. The Zen of Submission.

  She wanted to be touched. She wanted his cock in her mouth. And he was still fully dressed. For God’s sake, she didn’t even know whether or not he had an erection.