by Maren Smith
She caught her breath, blinking back what tears hadn’t managed yet to escape. For now, however, her crying was done. “Yes, Sir.”
“When you wake up tomorrow,” he continued, “you will do so already knowing you still have a punishment coming. I am going to make you sore. You don’t come to me already in that state; that is unacceptable. You come to me a pale, unmarred canvas and I will paint you in what shades of pain I want you to feel. Now, do you understand that?”
Her hands, curled up in tight fists, relaxed just a bit. Her shoulders eased. She blinked several times, then nodded. “Yes, Sir.”
“So, knowing that,” he said calmly, “when I ask you a question, instead of telling me something I didn’t ask, what should you be doing?”
She clasped her hands tight in front of her, worrying her own fingers even as the rest of her small body relaxed a little. “It’s a collar.”
“If I put this collar on you, what does that mean?” Just saying the words sent a shiver through him. He’d been married to the last woman he’d collared. What a hideous mistake that had been and yet, this didn’t feel like that. It obviously didn’t feel that way to her either, judging by the soft flush spreading pink all across her face.
She bit her bottom lip, chewing it before hesitantly answering, “It means I’m in your program.”
“No.” Leaning closer, he hooked a finger into the velvet band around her neck and gave it a gentle tug. “This means you are in my program. The problem is, Eden, you are not like every other Little Maid in my care. The problem is, I think you think you are. We are contracted, you and I. I realize you don’t have the same experience I do and, therefore, you don’t have the same understanding of what that means. So that is what I want to teach you. This—” he held up the collar, “—this is a bullshit collar.”
Her brows beetled in confusion and she looked at it.
“It’s bullshit,” Grimsley continued, “because I didn’t pick it out specifically for you. It’s not personalized to you. It doesn’t mean anything, to either one of us. It’s simply something I had sitting around in the back of my closet. But—” he paused, turning the collar to show it to her from all sides, “—if I were to remove your costume collar and put this on you, then that would change things. That would give it meaning. What do you think that meaning would be for you?”
Just before her expression shuttered and all hint of her inner thoughts slammed shut behind a wary wall, he could have sworn he glimpsed wistfulness. She rolled her lips before carefully answering, “I don’t know. Maybe if you tell me, then I won’t jump to wrong conclusions.”
“There are no wrong conclusions when it comes to collars. Just differences in expectations.” He turned the collar over in his hands, knowing in his gut what he wanted to say, knowing in his head that it was too soon. Nobody collared anyone after two days and expected anything good to come of it. Realistically, they were two very different people. His entire life was organized, from the moment his alarm went off in the morning until he set his pocket watch on the bedside table and went to sleep at night. Eden didn’t even wear a watch. He was pretty sure once the newness of her wore off, that was going to drive him crazy.
“Okay.” She hesitated. “What sort of expectations should I have from a…” she looked at him, “…from a bullshit collar?”
He almost smiled. Listening to her was a lot like hearing a four-year-old swear—on the one hand, he was pretty sure he ought to correct her for it; on the other, it was just cute enough to warrant a chuckle.
He picked his words carefully. “In this case, Eden, I think I would want to treat this as a play collar. It would simply reaffirm that I am more than your employer and you are more than any other Little Maid in my program. That means, when you are wearing this collar, you are my property to the extent of the guidelines that we are about to draw up. If someone comes to you while you are in my collar and asks you to sub for them, it doesn’t matter what the circumstances or who they are, you will tell them: I am the Master Butler’s submissive and I am not allowed to play in any capacity without his knowledge and permission.”
Lying down the way she was, it was easy to see the shiver that went through her when he said that. Her shiver sparked an answering one in him. It raced in staticky patterns under his skin, zipping through every waking nerve until it all collided in the core of him in a sudden lightning-like crack so physical that it was damned near audible.
“I don’t mind not being able to play with other people,” she said, a tell-tale catch in her breath.
“For the sake of full disclosure, you won’t be playing with me, either.” Unbuckling the collar slowly, he drew the supple leather through fingers so eager to reach for her that they felt stiff and uncooperative. “I don’t play, Eden. I take. I demand. I expect, and in exchange for all of that, I pledge to you that I will see that all of your needs are met. Water, shelter, sustenance, rest. Discipline.” He watched her. “Sex.”
Her breath hitched and that tiniest of shivers went through her again. Was she even aware that her toes had just curled and her pelvis undulated, rocking the smallest circling press against the couch? If he’d blinked at the wrong time, he’d have missed it.
Grimsley never missed anything. It was what made him good at his job.
The stitched edges of the collar cut into the creases of his knuckles, a sharp tactile contrast with the softness of the fake fur that lined the inside. He ran the collar through his fingers again, forcing himself to relax his grip.
“Okay,” she whispered.
“I am going to get you a copy of my contract of ownership,” he said, noting how her breathing had quickened, how her thighs kept flexing, how the brilliant blue of her eyes had darkened, taking on a storm quality in the face of her lust.
He was not frightening her, oh no. She was absolutely turned on by what he was suggesting. He could smell the flood of honeyed wanting flowing from her. All he had to do was dip his fingers into the shadowed curve between her legs and feel for himself how slick she’d become, but he didn’t. He didn’t want her to feel pushed or manipulated into agreeing to something she truly didn’t want.
“Okay,” she repeated, that shiver of anticipation now clearly heard in her trembling voice. She definitely didn’t sound like someone being forced into something she didn’t want.
“You will read every line in my contract,” he ordered. “If you agree with my terms, you will—”
“What if I read it, but I don’t understand some of it?” she blurted, raising her head up off the couch. “What if I have questions? What if I agree with most of it, but there’s parts I don’t—”
“What,” he said, cutting her off, “have I told you about interrupting?”
She sank back onto the cushions. “Not to do it. Because it’s rude and you don’t like it.” After a moment, she hesitantly raised her hand.
Now he knew how Emerson the ‘schoolmaster’ felt day in and day out. He pointed to her.
“Everything I asked before. Plus, what if I like parts of it, but not others?”
“Then we negotiate.” Standing, he gestured at her. “Kneel up. Head on your arms, bottom in the air.”
He would have taken his belt off, but he still had the collar in his hand. The fake fur on one side made that part ineffective as a spanking implement. He ran his fingers over the silver lettering on the other side, making sure there were no sharp edges that might inflict damage he didn’t intend.
She looked from him to the collar before ducking her head onto her arms and obediently raising her bottom into the air.
“Spread your legs as far apart as the couch will allow.” It was his first time spanking a woman on this couch. On any of his personal furniture, for that matter. “Six for interrupting,” he said calmly, but that calm was a joke. His nerves were humming, so much so that his hands felt shaky as he gripped the buckled end. His aim, however, was dead on, lashing low across her buttocks just above the crease of her thighs, where
the skin was its most sensitive. Next to the pussy, of course, though that wasn’t his aim. He was hitting too hard for so tender a place, and this—while not severe discipline—was serious enough that he wanted it to stick with her. He put just enough wrist into it to make each crack of leather to skin echo in conjunction with her gasps and then cries. He put just enough arm in it to raise bright red lines with each stroke. When he reached six, he stopped.
Looping the collar around his hand, Grimsley sat back down to watch and wait while the worst of her squirming undulations writhed themselves out. She wasn’t crying, but she was right on the brink. He liked that. He liked the sounds she made, and the way she looked as she fought to keep her hands from flying back in defense of her bottom. Still, as if she weren’t yet aware the spanking had stopped. And when the pain did finally abate to the point where she could again calm and open her eyes, her face was almost as red as her bottom.
“That was for interrupting,” he told her softly. “Now, we can do the rest of tonight one of two ways. You will read my contract, which is nothing more complicated than a list of my rules and a variation of all the likes and dislikes you filled out in your admission packet. I’ve trimmed it down to include only those fetishes and activities that I enjoy or which I’m willing to do. In this way, I’ll be able to see those areas in which we most closely match. Now, option number one: We discuss the contract over supper, after which you feel comfortable enough to sign it, and I put this collar on you. You will then receive a long, thorough spanking and you will go to bed. Option number two: We discuss this form over supper, but you do not sign, so I do not put the collar on you. However, I am still your Dom and your employer, you will still get a very long, hard spanking because you have earned it, and if you are at all confused on that point, trust me, we will discuss all of it while you are kicking and crying upon my knee. Afterwards, I will put you to bed and we can discuss this further in the morning, if you still want to. Now, do you have any questions?”
Eden raised her hand.
Stifling a sigh, Grimsley pointed at her. “Yes, Eden?”
“What’s for supper?”
Of all the things he’d expected her to ask, that one caught him completely by surprise. But she was Eden, so of course it did.
Shaking his head, for the first time in a long time, he actually laughed.
Chapter 13
Grimsley lay on the couch, propped up on a small mountain of pillows. His shoes were kicked off and Eden’s file lay open across his lap so he could compare her answers with those she’d given when first applying to the Castle for a job. As for Eden herself, as of twenty minutes ago when he’d last checked on her, she was still lying on her stomach in his bed, the last of her tears still drying on her face and the sheet kicked all the way off her bottom, presumably because she couldn’t bear even the soft scrape of his Egyptian cotton.
Grimsley flexed his hand, more than aware any other Dom might have opted to use an implement, particularly towards the end when he’d given the last twenty or so with all the strength of his arm. Well. A lesser Dom could use whatever the hell he wanted, Grimsley had chosen his hand for a reason. Just like holding her pinned across his knee, he liked the intimacy of both hearing and feeling his bare hand striking her equally bare bottom. He liked the squeals and the squirming, the kicking that turned into bucking. He liked every nuance of taking her through all the levels of frantic disbelief that anything as laughable as a spanking could hurt this much, until finally she lay limp and bawling, promising with every hiccupy breath she took that she would never do it again. He liked the connection and the high he got when he at last let go enough for her to slide off his lap onto the floor. From there, with her hands pressed to the sides of her hips, her bottom blazing so sore and so hot that she couldn’t even bring herself to rub, she buried her face against the side of his leg and wept.
He’d never wanted to hold a woman as badly as he did with her tears soaking into his pants.
Fighting to keep his own hand from shaking, he touched those golden chaotic curls, comforting her with the same hand that had so fiercely punished her. He didn’t care how much it hurt or if he spent the rest of the week with a bruised palm, he was already decided. This was going to be their bedtime ritual from now on. Every night, whether she’d displeased him that day or not, he was going to spank her, just so he could feel this same sense of connection.
He had to check on her again. He set both his contract and her folder aside; he hadn’t truly been reading them anyway. Rather, he’d just been staring into space with a pen in his hand. Occasionally, he pulled himself together long enough to mark a discrepancy if he found one, but none were major. As far as he could tell, she’d told the truth on her application form and she was telling the truth now. These little discrepancies were nothing more than the modifications anyone in the lifestyle experienced, particularly in the beginning, when real tastes of the lifestyle at last began to shape them. No, all these slight changes that he was marking with his pen meant nothing more than that Eden was learning.
She was learning under his hand.
Rising, he ventured across the living room to crack open the bedroom door. Exhausted by her spanking, she’d cried herself to sleep some time ago. The urge to move in closer was so strong. That was the trouble with intimacy and connection; neither preferred the status quo for very long. The need for more always reared its hungry head and pushed for deeper satisfaction, the likes of which at this point could only be gained by shedding his clothes and slipping into bed beside her. By touching her and hearing the soft sighs as she arched up into his caresses, begging without words to be held even closer.
He had restraints in the closet. What a small thing it would be to go and fetch them. Beautiful as she was right now, with the sheets bunched down around her knees and her ass on fiery display, she would look even more so with her hands cuffed to the headboard. Pinning them out of his way and freeing him up so he could explore all the rest of her in exquisite thoroughness while he claimed her body with his.
He could do that now. It was written in black and white on the bottom of every page of his contract, and in particular, in the section marked ‘Sexual Congress.’ Without the slightest hesitation in her pen strokes, she had given consent allowing him to do as he pleased, when he pleased and how he pleased.
He was so, so tempted. Unfortunately, every single negotiation he’d had with her had occurred after the fact. After she was in trouble and faced with the seductive prospect of finally receiving her first adult punishment. Her first sexual punishment. Her first fingering, ginger figging; hardcore anal discipline the likes of which would make most submissives safeword out regardless of how much lube he used or gentle stretching he employed before shoving himself as deep as he could reach and beginning that hard, scintillating ride that was sure to ruin what little ability he still had to resist her.
The only reason he didn’t was because consent given after the fact wasn’t any different than no consent at all. How many submissives had he funneled out of the Little Maids program and into something safer in an attempt to stop the cycle of abuse? Too many for him to become a perpetrator of it now himself.
He went back to the couch, determined to spend the whole night there. Determined not to go back and ‘check’ on Eden, not once more.
He broke that vow half a dozen times before the crack of grey pre-dawn began to lighten the morning sky. But he kept his hands to himself. It half-killed him and what little sleep he got was fitful at best, but Eden spent the night safe and sound. Even if the worst person he had to guard her from now… was himself.
Eden woke up slowly, a little stiff, a little cold from the legs up because she’d slept out from under the sheet, a little hungry and a little bit horny too. Her sex felt raw as only a woman abandoned at the peak of arousal could be in the unrequited quiet of the morning after. She also needed a shower, something she became only too well aware of when she raised her arms to stretch and caught a sligh
t whiff.
She sat up slowly. The Master Butler’s bed was so much more comfortable than her cot in the Little Maids’ dormitory had been. The only twinge she felt was the one that accompanied her realization that Grimsley must have spent the night sleeping on his couch. Like a gentleman, she tried to tell herself. Like a guy who didn’t physically want her, whispered that ugly inner insecurity that most women had.
Or maybe just like a guy trying not to fuck something up by moving too far, too fast.
Ignoring the clean maid’s uniform folded at the foot of her—his—bed, Eden wrapped herself in his queen-sized top sheet and padded from the bedroom to the living room. Coffee was percolating in the coffee-maker, brown liquid dribbling down through the filter into a glass pot only half full. Two mugs had been set out—on a tray, no less—alongside little ceramic containers for cream and sugar cubes, with a bottle of half and half on the counter, just beginning to bead with condensation from the coldness of having been in the fridge.
As she stole a cube of sugar, she became aware of the whisper of running water, something flowing in greater quantities than the trickling coffee. Her eyes followed her ears. Eden found herself looking at the crack of light spilling out from under the closed bathroom door. Grimsley was in the shower.
Her feet moved her before she could stop them. Her hand was out; she touched the door. First with her fingertips and then leaning in, she pressed her cheek against the smooth wood. She could all but feel the vibrations of him, of the water beating down through his dark hair, running in rivulets over the lean contours of his back as he soaped himself under the spray.
Eden rolled, pressing her forehead to the door next. This was so foreign to her. She’d never wanted anyone as desperately as she wanted Grimsley. After three small days? Ridiculous! And yet, her nipples were tightening, her body straining as she helplessly envisioned the bubbles and water drops flowing off him, to the point that she could almost feel it with him. She could feel the mugginess of the steam as she breathed, and the heat through the wood, through the water… through the press of his skin as he turned when she stepped into the shower with him.
