Black Light: Exposed (Black Light Series Book 2)

by Jennifer Bene

  “But she does. Do you know what happened when Chase and I went to talk to her?” He barely paused. “She handed over everything. Her notes, her laptop, even her phone, and she started crying. Fucking sobbing so hard she couldn’t breathe. She kept telling us that none of it mattered, because you didn’t care – but here’s the thing, Thomas, I think you do care. I think you care a lot.”

  “No, she’s right. It doesn’t matter, because she lied to me. She’s not a submissive, she’s not honest, and she used me to try and take down your club. Why are you even defending her?” Thomas pushed a hand through his hair, contemplating walking back out the way he’d come. “Is this what you brought me here for? To rehash this bullshit?”

  “You’re wrong.”

  “What?” he growled.

  “Maddie is a submissive.”

  “You don’t know what you’re talking about.” Thomas felt his anger pulsing again, his temper ready to snap, because the worst part of everything he’d been stuck remembering for the last week had been the memories of how she’d responded to him. It had felt so real, but it had all been fiction. A clever ruse by a very smart, very beautiful girl.

  Jaxson reached over the desk Danny usually sat at, and then the door to Black Light opened. “I need you to listen to me, Thomas. You got into the lifestyle before me, and we didn’t talk for a while, but since we’ve reconnected there’s always been one thing you’ve told me: it’s our job as Dominants to take care of our submissives. To take care of them, to teach them, to guide them – and to forgive them when they mess up.”

  “This isn’t some little mistake, Jaxson.” His voice was a whisper, but the younger man stepped close, and they were almost eye to eye, his friend just a little taller.

  “Shit happens, Thomas. Life is messy. The question here is whether you’re going to let a mistake, big or small, affect the rest of your life…” Jaxson took a slow breath, and tilted his head towards the door. “Or if you’re going to really look at what’s in front of you.”

  Thomas’ heart was pounding behind his ribs, a nervous tension making his shoulders tight. “What did you do, Jaxson?”

  “I haven’t done anything, I’ve just laid out the options. For you… and for her.” He turned away and pushed open the door into the club, which was eerily silent. Empty.

  For her?

  Thomas walked forward in a daze, pulling the door shut behind him as he watched Jaxson head onto the main floor, stopping in front of one of the raised, circular stages. There was a wooden whipping post erected in the center of it. “What is this?” Thomas whispered, and Jaxson pulled him towards a pair of leather chairs that had been moved to face the stage.

  “Sit down, watch, and listen.” The authoritative tone in Jaxson’s voice made him want to argue, but then he saw Spencer, the club’s Dungeon Master, walk out from one of the locker rooms. The man’s normal suit jacket was got, the sleeves of his button down rolled up. What was going on? He blamed his shock for how he let Jaxson push him down into the seat.

  Spencer paused beside a couch, leaning down to rip a girl in a gray shirt and black yoga pants upright, fiery red strands in his fingers as she gasped. Maddie? “Come on, girl.”

  It was her.

  He saw her face the second Spencer turned her around to push her towards the raised platform, and Thomas immediately tried to stand up – but Jaxson’s hand on his shoulder forced him back into his seat. “Listen,” his friend whispered.

  “Up,” Spencer ordered, and she walked barefoot up the steps to the stage. Part of him wanted to call out to her, but he pushed it down, reminding himself that whoever this was – she wasn’t his.

  So why the fuck was Jaxson making him watch?

  “Before we begin, tell me why you’re here.” Spencer walked the floor around the stage. “Speak, girl.”

  “To be punished,” she whispered, and it was only the relative silence of the room that made her audible.

  “Excuse me?”

  “To be punished, sir,” Maddie spoke louder, but her eyes stayed down at her hands, fingers twisting together.

  “Good. Strip down to underwear.” The command was given as Spencer walked away to the wall of toys and implements, but Thomas’ eyes couldn’t leave her, his muscles bunching as he almost got up again.

  “Stay down, and listen, Thomas,” Jaxson urged him, and he tried, but as she started to pull the shirt over her head he wanted to cover her up. Stand between her and everyone else.

  She’s not yours. She’s not yours.

  Her eyes found his for just a moment as she finished taking off her pants, but she pulled her gaze away before he could react. Then Spencer was returning with several things in his hands. “Face the post,” the man snapped and Maddie turned away from Thomas to obey.

  “Yes, sir,” she spoke softly, and he hated hearing her say that to anyone else. Even someone like Spencer, who was clearly only acting in his role at the club at Jaxson’s request.

  The cuffs were on her wrists too quickly, and the other man hooked her to the post, her heels lifted off the floor, leaving her stretched out and taut against the wood. A beautiful expanse of pale skin, where the last lingering marks of their play showed as mere shadows on one cheek of her round backside beneath the edges of her thong.

  “Your safe word is red.” The Dungeon Master spoke, but she didn’t answer, and he spanked her hard. “Acknowledge.”

  “Yes, sir,” Maddie droned, lifelessly. “My safe word is red.”

  She’s not going to use it.

  Thomas knew it instantly, but Jaxson’s grip on his shoulder tightened to the point of pain, forcing him to stay seated. Spencer leaned down and picked up a long flogger made of a thick, oiled leather. “You told me you’re here to be punished. Why?”

  The man stepped back, shaking out the flogger, and Thomas tensed. “Because I lied,” Maddie spoke the words evenly, but she gasped as Spencer brought the leather across her shoulders in a hard swing, the lines appearing fast.

  “What did you lie about?” he asked, and struck her with the flogger again, mid-back.

  “I said I was invited to Black Light!” she cried out, whimpering as the leather landed the other direction across her shoulders again. Bright, pink skin already.

  “Why did you sneak into my club?” Spencer asked, and Jaxson made a noise behind him just as the leather struck again, turning her upper back into a network of lines from the many falls. Maddie was barely letting out a noise with each strike, but in his experience that kind of oiled leather could sting and thud enough to send other subs into tears.

  “I was going to write an article about it.” The strike that followed was harder, the crack of the leather loud, and Maddie whined, her fists balling up on the other side of the cuffs. “I did – I did write an article.”

  “That’s right, you did,” Spencer replied, and delivered a series of hard strikes of the vicious flogger across her ass and thighs. Maddie jerked with each of them, bouncing on her toes at times as she pressed forward against the post, but there was no begging, no pleading, no screaming. Just a stifled whine, or a shortened gasp.

  “She’s not going to stop him,” Thomas hissed, twisting to look up at Jaxson, but his friend’s face was expressionless. Neutral. As if he were the one delivering the punishment to the girl.

  Looking down at him Jaxson nodded, “I know.”

  “She’s not a sub, Jaxson. You can’t make her do this.” He felt defensive, angry, but his friend simply lifted an eyebrow.

  “I didn’t make her do anything. I talked to her, I asked her what she wanted, and I gave her an option for how she might get it.” The man sighed. “And, despite what you think, Thomas, she is a sub.”

  The loud pop of leather striking skin was echoed by a quiet cry, and Thomas glanced back at Maddie’s red, striped skin before he turned to Jaxson again. “What do you mean? What does she want?”

  “Forgiveness,” Jaxson answered quietly. “And I told her a way that submissives can t
ry to earn forgiveness, but she chose this. So, will you stay seated? Listen to her confession?”

  “Why did you do this?” he asked as his friend released him and moved to the chair right next to his.

  “Because you both need it.” Jaxson tilted his head back towards the platform, where another strike had just landed on her thighs, leaving glowing marks behind. “Watch. Listen to her – and think about what you want.”

  “Why else are you here to be punished, girl?” Spencer dropped the heavy flogger to the platform, picking up a quirt. The split ends were angled to a point, and he could tell just by the look of it how much it would hurt her.

  Maddie lifted her head, shaking her hair out over her shoulders as she looked up at the ceiling. “Because I deserve it.”

  The first lash across her ass made her jerk, a quiet cry leaving her lips, but then Spencer shook his head as he paced behind her. “I know you deserve it. Confess.”

  Another strike, harder, and she screamed, “Thomas!”

  He almost answered her call, but Jaxson reached over and grabbed onto his arm as she continued with tears in her voice.

  “He tried to help me, he brought me in here because he believed me. He was… he was good to me, too good. He was perfect, and I – I used him. I did this.” Maddie didn’t even try and hold back her sobs this time as Spencer delivered the lashes in even, measured strokes. Adjusting to even out each side as he moved from her ass to her thighs, leaving dark red spots that promised bruises. She was pulling at the cuffs, squirming up on her toes, but she didn’t even beg. Didn’t ask him to stop.

  “What else?” Spencer asked, the quirt dangling from his hand like a hungry thing.

  “I ruined everything. I was selfish. I lied, and I lied…” she sobbed, her body shaking and he was up out of the chair before Jaxson could stop him. The next lash landed, and he wanted to rip the quirt from Spencer’s hand.

  “Spencer!” Thomas shouted, and the man turned to look at him. Calm, and cold. “Stop. I’ll take over.”

  “We don’t allow punishing while angry in this club. If you have something to add to her list, speak up, but you stay seated.”

  “I will handle the rest,” he growled.

  “Not in my club, boy.”

  Maddie was sniffling, her forehead pressed against the wood of the post as she caught her breath, and he found himself speaking before he could question it, “She’s my sub. I have it.”

  “Absolutely not.” The Dungeon Master was staring him down, but he’d already made the decision and he wasn’t going to back off.

  “Let him, Spencer. You can watch with me. If he goes too far, we’ll stop him.” Jaxson’s words should have felt helpful, but instead he wanted to punch him for questioning his self-control – which wasn’t the most level-headed response.

  Maybe it was a good idea they were here.

  Thomas walked to the wall and pulled out a thin, whippy cane from a rack. Something that would hurt far more than it would mark, since Spencer had left her with so many already. As he stalked up the steps, he found himself face-to-face with Maddie for a moment. Cheeks flushed, blue eyes bright with tears, but she stilled her breathing as she met his gaze.

  “You lied to me about being a sub.” He accused as he walked around her on the platform, swishing the thing through the air.

  “I never said I was, I just let you believe it.” Maddie’s voice was harder, and it spiked his temper. The swat with the cane across her ass made her yelp through clenched teeth.

  “Lying by omission is still lying, that is clearly still a lesson you need to learn.” Adjusting the cane in his hands he prowled to her other side. “Did you know about me?”

  She shook her head, fiery hair flaring. “No. You just showed up after I found my way downstairs, and security stopped me, but then you –” Maddie’s breath was shaky, a groan filling in the pause. “But then I flirted with you, I wanted inside. I wanted to see.”

  “So, it was an accident, I was just convenient.” He heard the angry hiss of his voice, but he purposefully kept the cane still at his side.

  “I didn’t even know what was downstairs. I didn’t know you would be there, I had no idea about any of it, about how much I’d like it –”

  He landed the cane across her ass and she screamed, twisting in the cuffs. “Don’t lie to me!”

  “I’m not lying!” Maddie bounced on her toes, her legs shivering, the high cut black underwear framing the marks on her ass.

  “You liked this?” Thomas asked and delivered another strike, and another, and another, and then he saw Jaxson and Spencer stand up in his peripheral vision and he stopped. Breathing hard, finally able to hear the desperate whines coming from her as she pressed her hips forward to the post trying to avoid the next blow.

  “Yes,” she choked out. “I don’t know why, I don’t understand it, but yes. You called it subspace!”

  “She’s a masochist, Thomas,” Jaxson interjected, moving to the edge of the stage.

  “I know!” Thomas roared, and he threw the cane down to the floor, off the platform so he couldn’t reach it. His mind was spinning too fast, a flurry of emotions making it impossible to think straight. “God dammit, I know!”

  “Why don’t you let us take her down now?” Jaxson offered, but Thomas ignored him.

  “I want to hear the truth!” He moved until he could see her face, tear-streaked and red. “Was any of it real?”

  “Everything was real with you. All of it,” she spoke softly, just for him, but the pain was back in his chest. Doubting, questioning.

  “I don’t believe you.” Thomas turned towards the steps, unwilling to let her hurt him again, and then she shouted after him.

  “Then punish me until you do! Do whatever you want! Just please, please forgive me!” Maddie’s voice broke at the end, torn by her sobs, and it stopped him halfway down the steps.

  He turned to face her, but her eyes were closed, tears tracing paths down her cheeks, strands of her red hair stuck to them. “That is a very stupid request, Madeline.”

  She opened her eyes as he came back, stepping close to her. “I don’t care.”

  “You’re not scared?” Thomas asked.

  “I trust you.” Her words were surprisingly steady, and the flashback to their time in this very club, in front of the cross inside the dungeon room, overwhelmed him.

  The fire inside his hazel eyes was something she couldn’t look away from, because it was so perfect, and because part of her was worried it would be the last time she’d see it. For a moment she’d wondered if he’d really leave her there, if all of the discussions with Jaxson, and Chase, and Spencer had been for nothing – but then she heard the jingle of his belt as he undid it, followed by the whisper of him pulling it free.

  “You had so many chances to tell me the truth,” he growled as he stepped behind her, but she settled against the post, ignoring the ache in her legs, her ass, her back.

  “I know, sir,” Maddie nodded, and he landed the belt hard, overlaying the other marks peppered across her backside, and then he did it again, but she bit down on the cries of pain.

  “You pretended to be someone you weren’t, whether you said it aloud or not.”

  “Yes, sir, I know,” she agreed, and the confession made the bite of the belt easier to take, even though she couldn’t hold back the cry as he landed swat after swat after swat down her ass and thighs.

  “Thomas!” Jaxson yelled, a note of panic in his voice, but she needed this. Everything was getting out in the open, every dark thing she’d hidden exposed to the light, and he’d told her this was her only chance. There would be no second meeting with Thomas Hathaway. Heavy footsteps came around the platform, muttered curses accompanying them, before Jaxson growled, “That’s it. Back off. Now.”

  “NO!” she shouted at him as he got to the bottom of the steps, and he paused, his face questioning as she forced her breathing to even out, trying to stop the tears. “Don’t. I want this. Please… I�
��m okay, I swear.”

  “Ask me for another, Maddie,” Thomas growled behind her, and she nodded.

  “May I have another, sir?” Just as she asked, he delivered. Stroke after stroke until the pain blurred, and she found herself leaning hard against the wood, bracing her forehead to it so she could alternate which foot held her aloft. So much guilt, so much pain and loneliness in the last few days, and she’d already seen her future stretched out before her without Thomas in it – and she didn’t want that. She wanted him more than she’d ever wanted anything. A particularly sharp strike made her scream, and then she shouted the words she’d never said, but always should have, “I love you! I’m yours. I’ll always be yours…” She sobbed, her mind humming in some glorious place between pain and pleasure.

  “What?” He moved to her side to pull her head back by her hair so he could meet her eyes, the hard grip sending a sparkling rush down her spine.

  “I love you,” she repeated.

  Thomas’ eyes flickered over her face, a pained look pinching his brows together, and then he kissed her hard. It was forceful, leaving her lips feeling bruised before he parted them to delve his tongue inside and claim her mouth completely. She arched against the post, wishing her hands were free to touch him, but the low hum of his moan was perfect just before he pulled back and leaned his forehead against hers. “Dammit, beautiful…”

  “I’m so sorry,” she whispered. So grateful to feel his skin on hers that the tears started again, but in a moment he was unclasping her arms from the post, catching her around the waist when her legs decided they were no longer interested in keeping her upright.

  “I need you,” he groaned as he pushed her back to the post, pain flashing somewhere underneath the haze in her mind.

  “Yes, sir. Please.” Maddie’s world spun as he picked her up and tossed her over his shoulder, stomping down the steps to move towards a wall of curtains. She caught sight of Jaxson and Spencer, both standing with their arms crossed, as he walked them away.

  Thomas didn’t put her down until they were inside the curtain, tossing her onto a narrow bed, waking up the vicious network of welts, but it didn’t matter when he immediately covered her body with his. Their lips clashed again and she moaned against him as they shifted backwards on the bed. “Maddie…” he whispered, sliding his hand between her thighs, beneath her underwear, to stroke at her wetness.