Safe Word

by Christie Grey

  “What is this place?” Melody asked as Zane opened the door.

  He didn’t reply and he didn’t have to. As soon as Melody got a look inside the building, the answer was very obvious. Floor to ceiling shelving units lined the walls and they contained every size, style and color of sex toy imaginable. As she gawked at the wide variety of devices, Melody realized she didn’t even know what some of them were.

  On the floor in the center of each aisle were large, provocative displays. Melody had never seen such racy looking mannequins before! Most of them wore extremely slutty lingerie, though a few wore latex corsets and spiky faux leather dresses. One held a whip in its hand. Another was down on its knees and had a red ball gag in its mouth, which was secured to its head with a leather harness.

  Melody was stunned.

  “You brought me to a sex shop?” she squeaked when she finally had words.

  “Technically a wholesaler’s warehouse, but yes,” Zane nodded. “I’m sure you and I can have all sorts of fun with no toys at all. Hell, you could even make missionary position in a dark room exciting, no doubt. But toys can add a whole new dimension to a Dom/sub dynamic like ours, plus they open up a bunch of new fun possibilities for playtime...”

  That was the first time Zane had referred to their arrangement as a Dom/sub one. Zane was Melody’s Dominant, and she was his submissive. She let the words roll around in her head for a moment, unsure of what to make of them. It made the whole thing seem a lot more formal, somehow. She liked that.

  “Let’s look over here,” Zane said, guiding Melody down an aisle full of restraints.

  She stared in awe at all the different types of bondage equipment in front of her. There were sex swings, under-the-bed restraints, fancy types of rope and even a table with stirrups. A shiver ran through her, and she was thankful when Zane kept walking.

  “What’s this for?” Melody asked, pointing to a sturdy, padded wooden bench.

  She ran her hand lightly over the soft leather cushioning, thinking that it truly was a beautifully crafted piece of furniture. But she had no idea what purpose it was supposed to serve. It was a strange height and shape to sit on and besides, since they were in an adult toy warehouse, its function was undoubtedly something naughty.

  “It’s a spanking bench,” Zane replied patiently. Then with a grin, he remarked, “I think it’s interesting that’s the one you honed in on. Hmm, maybe your subconscious is trying to tell us something, do you think?”

  Her eyes widened. “No!”

  Zane laughed and put his arm back around her shoulders. Then his hand slid down lower until it brushed against her very erect nipple. “It would seem you’re turned on by the thought of the spanking bench though, wouldn’t it?” he observed.

  “It’s cold in here,” she retorted, squirming out of his grip before anyone noticed him openly fondling her in the middle of the store. Thankfully the few customers milling about seemed so engrossed in the merchandise that they were oblivious to much else.

  Truthfully, the temperature probably wasn’t the cause of the state she was in. No, something else was to blame for that! Crossing her arms over her chest self-consciously, Melody cursed her stupid too-thin white blouse.

  Then she followed along behind Zane as he strolled up and down every aisle, pausing to ask her opinion on various toys and other naughty gadgets. He seemed to be paying very close attention to her reactions, and she got the feeling he was trying to gauge her interest level in various activities. It was the dirtiest – and most exciting – window shopping Melody had ever done.

  As they were leaving, Zane stopped by the front counter and handed the cashier his credit card. There was a large, discreet brown box already sitting on the counter, waiting for him. After payment had been made, the cashier handed the box to Zane and thanked him for his business.

  “What’s that?” Melody asked curiously as she and Zane made their way out of the store.

  “I called in ahead of time with an order,” he replied, the box tucked neatly under his arm. “It’s just a few things to play with, if the mood strikes me. I like to have options,” he grinned, looking beyond excited by the thought of introducing Melody to his new toys.

  “Will you tell me what’s in there?” she tried again, desperate to know.

  “Nope,” he told her matter-of-factly. “I’d rather keep you wondering.”

  “Humph,” she retorted, pouting.

  “Are you ready to go home?” he asked as he loaded the box into the trunk of his car.

  “Yes!” Melody exclaimed, brightening at the thought.

  She couldn’t wait to return to the condo and spend the remainder of the weekend with Zane. The anticipation and uncertainty she felt had Melody tied up in knots. Letting a man take the reins in the bedroom was proving to be quite the adventure. More specifically, letting Zane take the reins was perhaps the most thrilling thing she had ever done.

  Chapter 12

  “You’re awfully quiet. Talk to me! How do you feel about what we did today?” Zane asked Melody as they drove home from the city. “Did you like it when I grabbed you – when I groped you – in public?”

  “Yes,” she said, blushing.

  “Mmhmm, I thought you liked that,” he winked, sounding pleased by her admission. “And how about our playing in the car on the way up here?” he asked excitedly. “Did you like that, too?”

  Melody hesitated.

  Truthfully she was slightly disappointed Zane was keeping his hands to himself on the ride home, although maybe it was for the best. She didn’t know how much more teasing she could take! Trying to ignore the craving in the pit of her belly, she admitted, “I mostly liked it, but I was nervous.”

  “Nervous isn’t always a bad thing,” he pointed out, sounding confident and wise. “The whole point of all this is for me to figure out what your limits are. We’re going to be trying a lot of new things over the next little while, Melody.”

  Even though the announcement came as no surprise, Zane’s words made Melody shiver in delight. “Are we?” she asked innocently, just wanting to hear him talk about it some more.

  “Mmhmm, we sure are.”

  “I like that!”

  “You might like it now. I’m not so sure you’ll always like it later on, but we’ll see. Once I get a better sense of your likes and dislikes, I’m going to do my damnedest to push you to your limits. But I’ll never push you past them,” he vowed.

  “How can you be sure you won’t?” she asked nervously.

  Suddenly her eagerness had turned to apprehension, especially since she had no idea what Zane had in mind. She understood his reasons for operating this way. He was right that she lacked the experience to really tell him her limits, and she appreciated that he was taking full control. Even so, it was scary sometimes.

  “It might be a bit of a guessing game, especially in the beginning,” he admitted. “But as your Dom it’s my job to pay very close attention to your body language and reactions. You need to talk to me and let me know how you’re feeling. And, should I ever misjudge your limits, that’s what your safe word is for,” he reminded her.

  “The way you talk, it sounds like you’ve had a lot of experience with this,” Melody observed.

  “Well I kind of have, I guess.”

  “Oh?”

  “I was sort of late bloomer,” Zane confessed, sounding embarrassed. “That Halloween kiss you and I had way back when we were practically still kids? That was about the only action I had until I was almost twenty.”

  “Ha ha, very funny,” she retorted sarcastically, assuming he was playing around.

  “I’m serious.”

  Melody was shocked by that, especially considering how completely gorgeous he was! “What?!” she demanded, even though she herself had been in her freshman year of college before she had lost her virginity. But still, Zane was Zane! That was what made his admission so shocking!

  “When I was almost twenty, I met an older woman,” he explained
. “She was kinky as hell.”

  “So you went from zero to one hundred right away?” Melody teased.

  “More like zero to one thousand,” he laughed. “She taught me a lot about what I liked and how to do it safely. She even took me to my first kink party, and introduced me to an entire group of people with similar interests. My relationship with her was short-lived, but that was the start of many years playing at the dungeon.”

  “Dungeon...?” Melody asked, taken aback.

  “It was a place downtown where a lot of us hung out. It was a judgment-free, almost anything goes sort of spot,” Zane replied. “I learned a ton there and met a lot of play partners over the years. I even dipped my toes into the scene in Australia, when I was over there. But then one day I stopped by a coffee shop, met a beautiful blonde woman and that all ended.”

  “You’re talking about your ex?” Melody guessed, feeling a twinge of jealousy.

  “Yes. Alexandra.” Zane sounded nostalgic when he said her name.

  Melody immediately – and for no real reason – thought to herself that she despised the name Alexandra. But she kept her mouth shut because what was she going to do, announce it to Zane? She knew she was being silly. She just didn’t know what to do about it.

  “I was so head over heels that I would have done anything to be with her,” Zane confided. “I tried to change everything for her. I tried to change who I was. But it didn’t work. Anyway,” he said, clearing his throat, “I haven’t been to a dungeon, kink party or sex club since before I met her.”

  “Why haven’t you?”

  He hesitated for a moment, and then admitted, “I hadn’t known what I was missing until I met Alexandra. What we had was so different from anything I had experienced before. With all my previous partners, the sex – the kink – was at the forefront of our relationships...if you can even call them relationships. But with Alexandra, well...”

  He trailed off, seemingly unwilling to go down that path.

  But Melody had a feeling she knew exactly what he was talking about. “You were in love.” She tried to say it without an edge in her voice, not wanting him to think she was accusing him of doing something despicable. She wasn’t sure whether she completely succeeded.

  “Yeah,” he agreed begrudgingly, almost as though he hated to admit it even to himself. “I was.”

  “Did she love you?”

  “For a time,” he nodded. “Until she found out what I was.”

  “What were you?”

  “A twisted, perverted sexual deviant,” he replied with a touch of bitterness.

  “Is that so bad?” Melody pointed out with a smile. “I happen to think it’s pretty awesome.”

  He chuckled then, but it sounded forced, like he was still completely hung up on the thought of his first – and only – love. “I’m glad you think so,” he told her. “But it’s a bit different when the love of your life is looking at you like you’re a sick monster she doesn’t even recognize. That shit hurts.”

  “What happened to accepting your partner?” Melody asked, unable to hide her dislike for stupid, judgmental, prudish Alexandra. How dare she break Zane’s heart? How dare that bitch win his heart in the first place!

  “It wasn’t Alexandra’s fault,” Zane said quickly, immediately coming to his ex-girlfriend’s defence. “Like I think I mentioned before, she had a strict upbringing and was very naive, very sheltered. She was completely, undeniably vanilla.”

  “Sounds boring,” Melody muttered under her breath, rolling her eyes. She didn’t know where all that negativity had come from, but now that it had worked its way to the surface she couldn’t seem to box it back up. It felt nice to get it out, so for good measure Melody added, “I bet you dodged a bullet with that one.”

  “She was an incredibly sweet girl,” Zane insisted, unwilling or perhaps unable to let Melody speak ill of Alexandra. “She was everything to me. She was my whole world.”

  Melody stared out the window, pretending the revelation didn’t bother her. It was completely irrational for her to be jealous, wasn’t it? Of course a man like Zane had been in love. It wasn’t surprising. And yet it kind of came as a shock. It felt like she had been stabbed in the belly – or maybe in the heart.

  “What about you?” Zane asked after they had driven in silence for a while.

  “Huh?”

  “Have you ever been in love?”

  “Oh.” At that moment Melody wished she could say yes. Maybe that was dumb, but she wanted to be able to tell a love story as passionate and heartfelt as Zane’s. But she had no such story, nor was she any good at thinking up fibs on the spot. So she shrugged and mumbled, “I don’t know, not really.”

  “Being in love isn’t exactly something a person can do halfway. Either you have been in love or you haven’t,” Zane pointed out sensibly. “So which is it?”

  “I’m not sure,” she told him, furrowing her brow and pretending to be deep in thought.

  She was trying to make it sound like she may have had a fervent, frenzied rendezvous or two as opposed to a string of so-so dates with a number of mediocre, unremarkable guys. But Zane wasn’t buying it.

  “If you had been in love, you wouldn’t have to think about it,” he informed her. “You’d know.”

  “Is that so?” she asked coyly.

  “Yes.”

  Dammit. He knew her too well. So much for trying to create an air of mystery...

  “I guess I’ve just never met the right guy,” Melody admitted. “Not every date has been awful, but there haven’t really been fireworks either. Maybe it’s my fault for expecting fireworks. Maybe the dates I’ve been on with the guys I’ve been involved with are as good as it gets. Maybe my expectations are too high.”

  “No. There should be fireworks,” Zane told her firmly. “Hold out for fireworks.”

  “Okay, I will,” Melody breathed, suddenly very aware that he was looking at her. She turned to meet his gaze and for a moment, she thought they were going to kiss. Hell, she was even foolish and idealistic enough to think maybe they would even create some fireworks of their own.

  Instead, Zane added, “And while you wait for your fireworks, you and I will have some fun.”

  Her heart sank. “Yeah, okay, great,” she replied, crestfallen.

  Who was she kidding? Zane didn’t see her as a romantic partner. He only viewed her as someone to have hot, kinky sex with...or at least engage in hot, kinky sex acts with. She was no different than the women he’d met at kink parties, replaceable and good for only one thing. It wasn’t that he had led her on, exactly, but Melody couldn’t help but feel used.

  “You’ve gone quiet again,” he observed a short while later, his tone upbeat. For someone who normally seemed so in tune with what Melody was thinking and feeling, Zane seemed oblivious to the angry black storm cloud that had suddenly rolled in over her head, darkening her whole world. “Is everything okay over there?”

  “Yeah, I’m just...tired,” Melody fibbed. “I think I need to take a nap when we get home,” she added, making it clear that she had no intention of playing when they arrived back at the condo. Then she leaned her head against the car window and pretended to drift off to sleep so that she wouldn’t have to talk to or even look at Zane.

  Chapter 13

  There was a gentle knock on Melody’s bedroom door the next morning. It roused her from a weird dream she’d been having, and she was none too happy about it.

  Her grumpiness had nothing to do with waking up on the wrong side of the bed and everything to do with being back to sleeping in her own bed.

  It had been her decision. She was the one who had pretended to be under the weather, faking a cough to avoid having to spend any time with Zane – funny how only a day prior she had been thrilled about spending time with him.

  Melody was still reeling from the harsh kick in the butt she’d received the previous day. It was her fault, of course. Zane had never promised her a relationship or romance. He had essenti
ally promised her a good time – no strings attached, wild kink. Everything else, Melody had dreamed up herself.

  She knew it wasn’t fair to punish Zane for her disappointment. He had done nothing wrong. And yet she couldn’t control her emotions. In the span of a single weekend, she’d gone from hopeless to thinking she had a chance with her best friend...and then back to hopeless. What a rollercoaster ride it had been.

  There was another rap on the door, this time more insistent.

  Grumbling under her breath, Melody climbed out of bed, readjusted the oversized t-shirt she had gone to sleep in and stomped over to the door.

  “What?” she demanded as she flung it open and came face-to-face with Zane. Well, she came face-to-face with Zane and a tray of food. Melody stared at it in confusion. “What’s all this?”

  “You said you weren’t feeling well last night, so I thought I’d bring you breakfast,” he told her as he walked past her and set the tray down at the foot of her bed. “Except I wasn’t sure what was wrong so I tried to cover all my bases.”

  Melody sat down on her bed and studied the contents of the tray with a touch of amusement. There was a glass of ginger ale, toast with honey, a lemon, a clove of garlic, a bowl of chicken noodle soup, a rapidly melting Popsicle and some ginger tea. All of those made sense, but the cold lasagne threw her for a loop.

  She looked at Zane questioningly.

  “Cold lasagne is your favorite, isn’t it?” he asked, understanding her question without her even having to voice it. “I’ve seen you eat the leftovers straight out of the fridge without heating them up or anything...”

  “Hmm yeah, I guess cold leftover lasagne is my favorite,” she agreed, unable to hide her surprise. Had someone asked her what her favorite food was she probably would have automatically responded with something cliché like pizza, but Zane was right. He knew her favorites even better than she did, it seemed.