by Alice Raine
‘It’s a new collar – well, a choker, really – but this one is less obvious so you can wear it when you are out if you want to. It would please me greatly if you always wore it,’ Nathan murmured. Another collar … Was this his way of claiming me? He’d said that he would replace my simple training one if and when he thought our relationship was developing. There was no way of getting away from the fact that we were dynamite in bed together so perhaps he was now viewing me as a more permanent fixture. Deciding not to ruin the moment with my stupid naïve questions I stayed silent and instead examined the necklace more carefully. Letting out a soft gasp, I ran my fingers along the stones, in awe of its simple beauty.
‘Do you like it?’ Nathan enquired in an odd voice.
‘Yes, I love it.’ I raised my eyes to his before remembering to avert my gaze. ‘Will you put it on me, please, sir?’
Lowering himself to the bed again Nathan sat behind me and removed the thin leather collar before replacing it with his purchase. It felt heavier, like it had more of a claim over me, and I hadn’t been kidding when I said I loved it. ‘When you wear it, it should remind you that you are mine,’ he said as his fingers brushed against my skin teasingly. ‘You belong to me,’ he murmured.
As a 20-something, independent businesswoman I should have hated the way Nathan was laying claim to me, but I simply didn’t. I wanted to be his, and although I knew he wouldn’t say it out loud, this new token of our relationship proved that in some way, Nathan was mine too.
‘Thank you,’ I gushed, my hand coming up to stroke the chain again, knowing that I would never take it off. Looking up at the confusingly neurotic man who had become such a major part of my life of late, I saw him frowning at my over the top gratitude, so sighing I cleared my expression, settled myself back in the pillows, shook my head in disbelief at all that had happened in the last hour and a half and then rolled my eyes as Nathan wordlessly left my room.
Crazy. Punished, then given a present. What a start to the weekend!
Chapter Twenty – Stella
Several weeks had now passed since the official start to my arrangement with Nathan – for some reason my dirty little mind judged ‘the start’ as the time we started sleeping together, not when we’d first met – and I had to say things were going surprisingly well. Nathan demanded a large percentage of my time while I was at his place over the weekends, not that I was complaining, but inevitably, at some point he would have work to do. I used these times as an opportunity to catch up on some work myself, use the gym in his apartment for some yoga, or do a little reading.
Work today had been deadly slow, ugh, I had been desperate to leave all day, so in the end I’d clocked out spot on five and headed straight to Nathan’s in the hope that he’d be home early too and might fancy brightening up my day with a nice start to the weekend. Unfortunately he hadn’t been home and I now found myself in the gym on the treadmill – yes, me on a treadmill – racking up my fifth kilometre of the evening and feeling rather proud of myself. The sound of the front door slamming followed by pacing footsteps disturbed my thoughts.
‘Stella! Stella? Where the fuck are you?’ Nathan’s yelling voice easily travelled through the walls into the gym and I winced at his apparent distress. Was something wrong? I could hear him thumping and banging his way around the apartment apparently searching for me. Rolling my eyes, I slowed the treadmill. Nathan was home then. Jeez, he sounded crazy, I hadn’t even seen him tonight, what the hell could I have done wrong already?
Slamming my hand down on the stop button of the treadmill, I jumped off and then after wrapping a towel around my sweaty neck I immediately went in the direction of his voice – the gym door that led to the bedroom corridor.
Opening the door I stepped out in time to see him striding around my bedroom looking frantic before he caught sight of me in the corridor and immediately paced out and joined me.
‘Stella. You’re here,’ he said on a rushed breath. I raised my eyebrows at the relief I detected in not only his tone, but his facial expression too, then noticed that he was still holding his car keys in one hand and briefcase in the other as if he had come searching for me straight away. How odd, had he thought I wasn’t going to show tonight? Had that worried him? Once again, I was left baffled by this thoroughly confusing man.
‘I was running,’ I said needlessly, given my gym clothing and sweat covered face it was probably fairly obvious what I had been doing. In front of my eyes, I watched as Nathan seemed to get a grip of himself and return to the normal cool and calm character that I was used to. That had been a very peculiar episode.
‘Running?’ he scoffed with a half-smile. ‘How ironic,’ he added on a murmur and I couldn’t help suppress my own smile too. After the fuss I had made last week, the irony of this situation was not lost on me either, but strangely last week’s wrangle with the treadmill had actually been quite enjoyable and I had been looking forward to another run all week. Looking forward to a run. Wow, they would never have been words in my vocabulary if I hadn’t met Nathaniel Jackson.
‘Finish your workout if you like, but I thought that for a change perhaps we’d go out tonight,’ Nathan said, pocketing his keys and loosening his tie, a movement I found rather distracting as small amounts of his skin became uncovered tempting me to lean in and taste it.
Dragging my eyes away from temptation my mind stuck on his final words … go out? So far, all of our encounters had been based at his place; we never went for meals or did anything that could be misconstrued as ‘romantic’, so it would be fair to say I was rather stunned at Nathan’s announcement that he was taking me out tonight.
I had no chance to enquire where we might be going though because he finally pulled his tie free and turned on the spot. ‘We’ll leave in an hour. Wear something fancy, clothes appropriate for a bar,’ he instructed me briskly before abruptly heading to his bedroom and slamming the door. I chewed nervously on my lower lip. Going out with Nathan? My dominant? In public? I made a low, apprehensive humming noise in the back of my throat as I considered this turn of events. One thing was sure though, from his demeanour it certainly didn’t seem like tonight was going to be a romantic occasion.
I had a nervous expression on my face as I applied my make-up, but I’d done as Nathan asked – I was wearing something ‘fancy’. My favourite little black dress with some killer heels and the choker necklace he gave me to wear in lieu of a collar. It was also about the only smart outfit in my limited wardrobe here. My hand was shaking so much that I had trouble with my mascara and for several minutes I seriously thought that I’d either be going out with none on, or alternatively have it smeared and dabbed all over my face.
Finally I was happy with my appearance; my hair was loose and behaving rather nicely, my outfit looked good, and I managed to wrestle my nerves under control for long enough to finish my make-up without looking like Alice Cooper.
OK, let’s do this. I walked back out to the living room with eleven minutes of my hour left but the sight before me made me suddenly forget how to breathe. Nathan looked stunning. The thing with Nathan is he always looks good. Casual jeans and a T-shirt? Looks good. Three-piece work suit? Looks good. Sweaty gym gear? Looks good. But bloody hell, does he carry off the smart casual thing well. He was wearing a black, long-sleeved shirt and grey trousers that clung oh-so nicely to his thighs … I suspected there was a jacket around here somewhere too, which would no doubt emphasise his gloriously broad shoulders. I wanted to swear out loud at just how explicitly edible he looked, but I knew he wouldn’t like me cursing so I did it in my head instead – fuck me, this man was fucking sex on legs.
Obviously hearing my approach Nathan turned to inspect me. I say ‘inspect’ and not ‘admire’, because that’s exactly what it felt like, an examination, his face remained impassive but his eyes swept from the tips of my toes right to the top of my head as he decided if I was suitable or not. Had I passed muster? I had no idea, and he wouldn’t make eye contact wit
h me so I really couldn’t tell.
Picking up a jacket that matched his trousers Nathan stalked towards me and paused just by my side. ‘Very fucking sexy, Stella,’ he murmured, still not looking at me, before lightly running his fingers around the choker with an appreciative grunt and then heading to the front door leaving me flushed and wobbling in his wake like the pathetic woman I was. Smiling, I followed him. He liked my outfit and that made me feel ridiculously pleased with myself.
As we descended in the lift, my nerves kicked back into gear. We’d never been out in public together; would this be like a date? I really had no idea. I must have been chomping on my bottom lip at a fair rate of knots because Nathan reached up wordlessly and used his thumb to halt my chewing. ‘I can see you’re nervous, Stella, don’t be.’ It wasn’t exactly a great pep talk, was it? But at least he’d acknowledged that this was out of my comfort zone, I suppose.
‘How do I act? Do I call you Sir?’ Did I want to call him Sir if we were out together? I usually only used the title in the bedroom, but I really had no idea how to approach this. God, I wished we had just stayed in and had a nice, normal shag now. Not that sex with Nathan was ever what I would call ‘normal’, but still.
‘I tell you what, as you’re nervous and still relatively new to this we’ll go to Club Twist. Everyone there is like-minded so that should ease your nerves.’ OK, that sounded a little better, although thinking back to some of the stuff that was being done last time – eye-popping displays of sexuality – I wasn’t sure it would particularly ease my nerves.
Apparently, still in thought Nathan suddenly narrowed his eyes and briefly looked down at me. ‘With regards to calling me Sir, I’ll leave it up to you, Stella, but just know that it would please me greatly if you did so.’ Right, no pressure there, then. I either call him Sir and make him happy or don’t call him Sir and piss him off. I rolled my eyes – over the past few weeks I’d learnt that happy Nathan equalled smoking-hot sex sessions, whereas pissed off Nathan usually lead to a rather quicker and less satisfying outcome for me, but enjoyable sex for him. I knew which option I wanted tonight – smoking hot – and I scoffed at my mind’s dirty path. Ah well, it was only a word, wasn’t it? I’m sure I could manage it for one night.
When we arrived at Club Twist, Nathan used a different entrance to the front one on the main road, choosing instead to park at the back and use a smaller private entrance. Walking in to the club again after so many weeks felt decidedly odd, especially as my mind was screaming ‘it’s a sex club!’ at me repeatedly, but I did my best to look casual and unaffected as I prepared myself to look around the venue again.
I could do this; it wasn’t like I was a prude or anything, so the sight of other people having sex shouldn’t be an issue for me really … but then I promptly changed my mind as my eyes wandered to a dark corner behind the stage … Oh, good God, whatever was going on over there involved whips and belts and lots of red raw flesh being pounded rather ruthlessly by a multitude of men … crikey. As I gulped in a breath, my eyes widened significantly, and I swallowed rather loudly while reaching out and linking my trembling hand through Nathan’s elbow for support.
‘We can avoid that side of the bar,’ Nathan murmured by my ear causing me to swing my head to find him watching the direct line of my gaze with a dark smile tweaking his mouth. ‘I never thought you were into that type of stuff anyway,’ he mused as his hooded gaze dropped curiously to where my hand was linked in his arm and clinging on for dear life.
Bugger, perhaps intimate contact like that was a no-no for Nathan, I had no idea, but as I went to pull my hand free he placed his on top and stilled me. ‘No, leave it there,’ he murmured. Wow, sometimes he really was surprisingly nice and, well … considerate.
Looking around the rest of the club, I was relieved to see it looked far more normal; people were dancing on the stage, drinking by the bar, and generally having a good time. Admittedly, there were several pedestals raised up with naked couples dancing on them and these were a little more racy, but still nothing to make me feel unduly uncomfortable.
‘All the good stuff happens at a second stage behind this dance floor,’ Nathan confided, pointing to another area round to the right. All the good stuff? What the hell did that mean? ‘I’ll show you later.’ Oh God, well it looked like I’d been finding out fairly soon.
‘So, what would you like to do, Stella?’ I choked on thin air at his question and when I turned to him my eyes must have been as wide as saucers, did he expect me to join in? Have sex in front of all these people? Not a frigging chance!
‘I was referring to whether you would like to dance or just get a drink, but I see from your expression that you misread me,’ Nathan explained, obviously trying to withhold a smirk. Git.
‘Sorry, Sir, I’m a little nervous,’ I murmured softly. Nathan’s face turned to mine as he heard my use of Sir and as well as feeling him tighten his arm around my hand I’m fairly sure I saw his arrogantly amused face soften, just slightly.
‘I can see that, I keep forgetting you’re new to all this. Perhaps no dancing just yet then,’ he concluded. Dancing and me didn’t really go well together at the best of times – I had serious co-ordination issues – let alone when my legs were rubbery and useless from nerves.
‘No, maybe we could just watch a while?’ I suggested, knowing full well that there was no way my wobbly legs would manage to carry me through any dancing without me looking like a complete prat.
This time Nathan couldn’t conceal his amusement, and grinned broadly at me. ‘I didn’t realise you were a voyeur, Stella.’
What ? My cheeks heated immediately, that was not what I meant and he must bloody well know it. ‘I’m not … I just …’ Huffing out a breath, I didn’t bother to try and finish my sentence – he was clearly teasing me and it was working a treat. The thing was, though, even though I’d never watched anything like this before I was actually finding it all rather arousing. Or maybe that’s just because I was here with Nathan and finding him arousing, which was really nothing new, I always felt in a constant state of arousal when I was near him, something I hoped never changed.
‘I’ll get us some drinks to help relax you,’ Nathan suddenly commented before gently detaching my arm from his elbow and disappearing into the crowd, leaving me stood at the corner of the dance floor feeling like a lemon.
I’m quite a fan of people-watching normally, but stood here in Club Twist I was finding it rather difficult to know where to look. To my left was that corner with the whipping thing still taking place so I wasn’t going to look there, to my right was a pedestal containing two naked women who were dancing and occasionally making out which made me feel a bit uncomfortable too, but if I just let my eyes wander the dance floor I inadvertently ended up rudely staring at some of the outfits being worn by a few of the dancers. Who knew that PVC was so popular? Surely, it would be horrifically sweaty to dance in? Or perhaps that was the point. Ugh.
Thankfully, Nathan returned with our drinks surprisingly quickly and led me silently around the side of the dance floor to a discreet alcove along the back wall. I noticed there were lots of them actually, all just big enough for a small round table and two chairs. The alcove was lit by a single candle and there was also a light gauze curtain across the entrance giving a hint of privacy, but still allowing you to watch the goings on in the bar, all in all it was quite cosy actually.
‘We call these the watcher holes,’ Nathan informed me, which seemed like an appropriate name to me. ‘They offer a perfect view of both stages so you can sit and enjoy the shows in relative privacy.’ Looking at me with a small smile, Nathan continued. ‘Seeing as you expressed an interest in observing I thought it appropriate we sit here,’ he added, obviously teasing me again. I quite liked this light-hearted version of Nathan that I was glimpsing tonight, but I couldn’t help but think he wouldn’t like it if I turned the tables and teased him back.
‘I didn’t mean I like to watch … it’s not
something I’ve ever done before,’ I replied huffily, but then I paused as I realised my little lie. I might not have done this before, but now I was here I was quickly learning that actually, I did quite like to watch, only when Nathan was beside me though, I’d never dream of coming here on my own, not in a million years.
He must be a bloody mind reader because the next words from Nathan’s mouth completely matched my own thoughts. ‘But you like it and that fact embarrasses you?’
‘No!’ I lied instinctively, I was a terrible liar, but hopefully Nathan hadn’t picked this up about me yet. Somehow it just felt wrong to admit it to him, did it make me a bit of a pervert if I was getting aroused watching this stuff?
One of Nathan’s hands closed around my wrist and tugged sharply to get my attention. ‘Stella, you are with me, if I ask you a question you do not lie to me, do you understand?’ he spat in a fierce whisper. The sudden severity in his voice made me glance at him and bite down on my lip, gone was Mr Light-Hearted, now he was just plain angry with me. Damn it, how did he manage to read me so well?
‘Yes, Sir, I understand,’ I murmured softly trying to appease him.
‘Are you enjoying the show?’ he asked again, his tone still clipped.
My swallow was loud and uncomfortable in my throat. If the music hadn’t been so loud around us I was fairly sure that Nathan would have heard it too. ‘I feel like I shouldn’t like it … but yes, I am enjoying it, Sir,’ I admitted eventually.
‘The people up there enjoy displaying themselves for others to watch, there is no reason for you to feel uncomfortable – everything here is consensual and for pleasure. If they didn’t wish to perform then they would simply have sex in the privacy of their bedrooms,’ he explained almost tersely making me wish I hadn’t opened my mouth in the first place.
Seeing as Nathan seemed to be in a foul mood now his next move took me completely by surprise as he suddenly dragged me from my stool across onto his lap. I gasped in shock, but actually rather liked this new positioning as he sat me between his legs with my back to his front and began to slowly massage my waist.
