by Jenna Jacob
“Asshole, huh? And all this time I thought we were friends.”
Embarrassment warmed my cheeks. “I’m sorry. I thought you were someone else.”
“Evidently. I was checking out the cameras in my office when I saw you come storming in like a thundercloud. I came down to make sure you were all right. I can clearly see you’re not. What’s going on?”
“Nothing,” I lied. “I’m fine. Just a little argument with—”
“With an asshole, yeah, I got that part, too. But if you thought said asshole had followed you into the club, then it’s someone I know. Who?”
“It’s not important. I’ll deal with it.”
“Let me rephrase the question. This is my club. You’re not only an employee but also a good friend. If someone is fucking with you, I demand to know who the hell it is!”
Mika rarely ever raised his voice, but he was doing so now. I knew I wasn’t going to be able to candy-coat this clusterfuck in sugar and rainbows. Dragging my shirt back on, I flopped down on the bed and scooted back against the headboard. Mika sat on the mattress and stared at me with probing amber eyes.
“Max,” I stated with a sour expression.
“Dylan’s friend Max? How the fuck has he managed to piss you off like this? He’s only been in town a whopping five seconds.”
“It doesn’t matt… Who did you think I was angry with?” I deflected his question with one of my own.
“Kerr. You’re always pissed off at that fuck-nut, but then aren’t we all?” Mika’s lips curled in disgust. “What’s Max done? Do I need to call Dylan and tell him that his friend is no longer welcome?”
“No. He hasn’t done anything.”
If you weren’t so damn sensitive about your qualities as a Domme… The asshat’s words echoed in my ears. I clenched my jaw.
“Sam. I’m not going to sit here and drag answers out of you. Spill it. Now!”
“God, you’re impatient.”
“Yes. I know. Julianna reminds me of that all the time. You’re stalling, and I’m losing the little patience she hasn’t already stolen from me.”
“Okay. Okay. Damn.” I scowled. “He hasn’t done anything. He’s a bastard who thinks it’s funny to tease me about…being a sub.”
“Max, huh?”
I nodded. “He thinks just because I ask the members what I can get them to drink…which, I reminded him, is my job, he says I sound like a submissive.”
Mika’s lips twitched as he bit back a grin.
“Don’t you dare,” I warned with a glare.
He stayed silent for several seconds as if struggling not to laugh. A whole new level of anger and hurt sliced through me.
“Obviously, you think I’m weak,” I bit out. “How many other members think I’m a sub in Domme clothing?”
“None,” he replied with a growl as if understanding the fragility of my emotions. I hated anyone to see me this way, even Mika. “Do you think Max senses something deeper inside you? Maybe he can see the—”
“Don’t say it. Don’t you dare let that word roll off your tongue.”
Mika scowled and sucked in a deep breath. “You can lie to me all you want, Sam. But don’t lie to yourself. Take a good hard look at why he infuriates you so. His playful teasing pulls deeply at you for a reason. I see the way he looks at you, but more importantly, I see the way you look at him. Max stirs something more inside you than anger.”
“I can’t. I can’t open that shit back up, Mika.”
“I don’t think you have a choice, sweetheart. You and I…we talked about this years ago. Remember?”
“Yes. I remember.” I closed my eyes as dread rippled through me.
“What I told you then still holds true today…tomorrow…forever. I support you a hundred percent.”
“Thank you. I love you for that.”
“I love you, too. That’s why seeing you like this rips me up…makes me worry.”
“Don’t. He’ll leave town soon and… Oh, god. No, he won’t,” I groaned. “He’s buying a house here in Chicago. But look on the bright side…you’ll soon have a new member of the club.”
“I don’t want you focusing on him becoming a member right now, Sam. I want you to go home. Soak in a bubble bath and figure out what you want. According to Julianna, relaxing in the tub rates right up there with ice cream and sex.”
“I don’t want time alone to strip back the layers of my head or my heart.”
“That’s exactly what you need, baby.” He sent me a sad smile. “Sort it out, and then meet me in my office tomorrow afternoon at four. If you haven’t come to a conclusion, we’ll figure where we need to go from there. All right?”
My stomach twisted. I couldn’t do what he was asking. Fear of what I might discover all but paralyzed me.
“There’s nothing to figure out. I know who I am. I know what I want.”
You did, but then Max walked through the door, and…
“Like I said, honey…lie to me all you want.” Mika stood. Effortlessly, he lifted me to my feet and hugged me tightly.
I wasn’t fooling Mika, and I certainly wasn’t fooling myself, especially when I felt my soul start to shift. Like tectonic plates, shimmying ever so slightly and rippling outward. Fissures split open, releasing an upsurge of dread, and threatened to spew a life long lost into the air for all to see.
I clutched Mika tighter as fear quaked through me.
As if sensing the ground cracking open beneath my feet, Mika issued a sympathetic sigh and rested his chin on the top of my head. “What can I do for you, Sam?”
I squeezed him hard and backed out of his hug. “Nothing. It’s something I have to do alone. In fact, I’m going home to sort this shit out once and for all. Don’t be surprised if I show up for work tomorrow with a whip slung over my shoulder.” I smiled with false confidence worthy of an Academy Award.
“If not, that’s fine as well. You know that, right?”
“I do.” I nodded resolutely.
Mika pressed a kiss to my forehead and left the room.
I suspected he’d dash back up to his office and park his ass in front of the security monitors and watch me like a hawk. Each of the private rooms was fitted with hidden cameras and microphones. Not for voyeuristic pleasure but for the members’ safety. The images fed upstairs, where he and the security staff could keep a watchful eye on private play.
Since big brother…err, rather, Mika was probably watching, I played to the camera and pretended all was fine as I dressed. When I headed down the hall to leave, I blew a kiss to the camera above the back door and strolled to my car.
Once I was inside my vehicle, tension and anxiety started to spike. I felt like a pressure cooker atop a high-flickering flame and struggled to tamp down the need to start dissecting my emotions then and there. As Dylan, Nick, and Sanna could confirm, texting while driving was dangerous. It would be suicide for me to peek under the lid of my churning past while behind the wheel.
Luckily I made it home before the lid blew off my inner shit pot. I’d managed to change into my robe, pour a glass of Hennessy, and drag down the dusty box from the shelf in my closet before the first tear fell.
Sitting on the couch, I placed the box containing my happiest and most horrific memories on my knees. I took a fortifying sip of brandy and then slowly lifted the lid.
On top were the newspaper articles I’d saved. I’d barely glanced at the image of smoke billowing from the twin towers when brittle fingers of pain clenched my heart and froze the blood in my veins. Time had done nothing to heal my wounds, only mask them behind layers of gauze and tape.
I made myself study the image. Questions that had plagued me for years, quickly resurfaced. Had Desmond been alive after his plane slammed into the North Tower? Had he suffered and called out my name, or had he been granted a merciful and instant death? Closing my eyes, I sent my mind wandering back to that dark September morning. Not because I was a masochist but because I was on a mission.
He’d been so wrong.
As he sat on the edge of the bed beside me, he bent and tied his shoes. I rubbed his back before he straightened and caressed my naked body with a loving dark-eyed gaze. Goose bumps peppered my flesh as I drank in the sharp lines of his nose and the defined angle of his rugged jaw. The man was beautiful, both inside and out, and I loved him more than life itself.
“When I get home, I want to find you just like this…waiting for me. Naked, wet, and ready.” The lurid promise in his eyes made my heart skip.
“If you didn’t have to be gone a whole week, I’d stay right here…of course, I’d starve to death before you got home.”
His rich, deep laughter warmed me like summer sun, the way it always did. Rising, I kissed my way up the back of his cotton shirt until I reached the patch of exposed skin above his collar. I breathed in his clean scent of soap and woodsy cologne before I pressed my lips to his neck.
Gripping the glass of brandy in my hand, I licked my lips. I could still taste his warm, familiar flavor. The air stilled in my lungs. Letting my tears flow, I rode the wave of anguish as it bore down hard upon me. These would be but the first of many I would shed before I was finished flaying myself open with the wicked knife of memories.
Lifting the newspapers, I placed them beside me. Steeling myself to look inside the box, I sucked in a ragged breath. Staring back at me was the beautiful man who’d owned my heart, the love of my life, Desmond. This single photo of him was the only one that remained. In a fit of rage and desertion, I’d burned all the others two weeks after he’d died. Looking at the gutting reminders of the joyful times we’d shared was like a slow suicide. I’d had to destroy them…all except this one print.
As I peered into the box, he smiled up at me. He looked so carefree, content, and happy. God, we were so fucking happy. The photo showed him leaning up against a tree in Central Park. It was summer, and the canopy of leaves overhead had danced shadows on his face. Still, I could see the unconditional love twinkling in his dark eyes. It had been a spectacular day. After a picnic lunch, we’d lain laid on a blanket, laughing and making grand plans for our future…a future of kids and a house in the suburbs.
But that wonderful future never came.
I took another sip of brandy and traced the tip of my finger over his dark hair. The wind had blown a shock of his black strands to carelessly fall across his forehead. Seconds after I’d taken the photo, Desmond had brushed it back and made a goofy face just to make me laugh.
Drawing my finger down the photo, I traced the outline of his sculpted cheeks, pausing at his lips. Every fiber in my being wanted to feel his warm, silky mouth against mine…just one more time.
Lifting the picture, I closed my eyes and pressed my lips to his as a strangled sob tore from my throat. Clutching the edge of the photo, I doubled over and tried to hold in the gutting grief, but it was too vast…too raw…too overpowering.
The unmitigated agony I’d resurrected burned hot. It was as scalding and violent now as it had been sixteen years ago. I sat there for a long time, rocking and sobbing as the desolate void consumed me. Through blinding tears, I compelled myself to set his photo aside.
Shoving the blade of the knife all the way to the hilt, I reached back inside the box.
The leather was still soft but cold…meaningless to my life now, but not my memories.
I clutched the collar that once adorned my neck and bound me to my One…my Master, my husband, my world. A bleak and abandoned wail rolled from the depths of my soul. The walls began to close in, trapping me in a prison of self-exhumed pain.
Leaning to his side, Desmond dragged his tongue up my stomach. I giggled and squirmed but remained open, giving myself freely to him as his mouth left a trail of fire on my flesh. The muscles of my stomach rippled and bunched beneath his tongue, and I felt him smile before he latched onto my right breast. His low, silky moan of approval vibrated over my nipple, and I softly exhaled, lost in the freedom of pleasing my Master.
Even after he’d kissed me good-bye and left our brownstone to catch a cab for the Newark Airport, my body and lips still tingled. I hugged his pillow, breathing in his soothing, comforting scent, and fell back to sleep. The phone woke me sometime later. A friend of ours who lived on Long Island was frantic and crying and told me to turn on the television.
Within seconds, my whole world crumbled like the mighty towers.
Lost in memories of heartbreak and pain, I sipped the brandy. Tasteless now, its warming burn had grown absent. I was numb and hollow, except for the lesions I’d sliced open again. They blistered and seared as the hemorrhage within flowed in a river of misery.
It didn’t matter that I no longer lived in New Jersey—unable to stay in a city surrounded by Desmond’s ghost, day and night—the raw ache for him to walk through my door and command me to my knees blazed deep in my soul. I longed to feel the foundation beneath me…that submissive security that encapsulated the world he’d provided with his powerful Dominance. But like the air heaving from my lungs, Desmond was gone, and he was never coming back.
Tears hot and free-flowing coursed down my face while sobs for life’s cruelest betrayal burned my throat. I’d never found a way to purge the anguish that scorched my soul. Even slicing my wrists—which I’d shamefully given thought to in the days following Desmond’s death—wouldn’t have rid the raw, corroded emotions within.
Brushing a hand across my cheeks, I absently smoothed away my tears and sucked in a quivering breath.
“Kiss the leather, princess.”
The centering command Desmond had uttered before the start of our sessions, whispered through my brain. Lifting his collar to my trembling lips, I kissed the soft leather. Its scent was still sweet and pungent. The craving to succumb to his will and savor his glorious direction enveloped me in a fiery blanket of desperation.
“Mark it with the same promise I gave you when I first placed that lovely leather band around your throat. That’s it, princess. I’ll always keep you safe, treasured, and loved. Hand yourself over to me, sweet slave. Let me mesh your power with mine and set you free.”
Shoving the box to the floor, I sank to my knees. A howl of forbidden surrender clawed up the back of my throat. Lowering my head, I raised the collar upward, offering the symbol of submission on open palms to the ghost of my Master.
Tears rained down my cheeks and splattered my thighs. The collar would never again be secured around my throat. Lost forever was the security and peace that once bloomed through my soul, so sweet and heady.
Desmond had left me…left me all alone to pick up the pieces of my shattered life.
Abandonment, like millions of blades, ripped me open.
I knelt before an apparition as anger, anguish, and anxiety consumed me. Ripped and tore at my heart and soul with their jagged teeth until the bloody carnage slowed and thrummed hollow within.
My arms trembled. My body shook.
Sobs of regret and fear echoed in my ears as I tore the cloak of Mistress Sammie from my bones and summoned Samantha—Desmond’s slave—into my heart, once more.
The submissive I’d buried deep inside spread her wings. Like a phoenix rising from the ashes, she blazed to the surface, fiery, hot, and screaming.
My power.
My control.
My Dominance lay smoldering at Samantha’s feet.
Stripped of my Dominant protection, I felt naked…scared…alone. I closed my eyes and searched the dark recesses of my soul. I opened my heart and embraced the somewhat awkward submissive from long ago and let the feelings rise up from deep inside me. Though standing on the cusp of a slippery and dangerous precipice, I had to determine—once and for all—what level remained of my former slave self.
She was still there, though fragmented and frightened. Curious and cautious, wondering why, after all this time, I chose to awaken her now. But then I fel
t it…that ancient warmth…a yearning to please smoldering beneath a black and charred veil of denial.
I hadn’t vanquished the yielding woman within, merely abandoned her. A scream of sorrow tore from my lips as I dropped my collar and crumpled into a ball.
Suddenly, my front door exploded inward with a deafening shriek. Shards of sawdust and splintered wood littered the air and tumbled to the ground as Max charged into the room. Snapping his head from left to right, as if looking for an enemy, he finally locked his stare on me…sobbing in the middle of the room.
Confusion, shock, and embarrassment surged within, while hot on their trail was a blast of rage and resentment. He’d not only violated my privacy but invaded my submissive inquisition as well. But Max ignored the daggers I tossed his way and thundered toward me, like an animal, with long, measured strides.
Crouching beside me on the floor, he desperately searched my eyes. “What’s going on? I heard you scream. I thought someone was trying to…”
He reached out to brush the hair from my face, but I slapped at his hand.
“Get away from me.” I leapt to my feet.
Guilt pumped through my veins as I darted a nervous glance at the condemning evidence scattered on the couch and floor. Spying the collar, Max reached out to pick it up.
“Don’t!” I yelled. “Don’t you dare touch that. It doesn’t belong to you.”
He drew his hand back as if I’d burned him with a blowtorch. Studying me with an even sharper gaze, he slowly dragged his eyes off me and stared at the collar lying on the ground. Lifting his head, he glanced around the room. Without a word, Max stood and walked to the couch. He stared at Desmond’s photo before locking on to the newspaper clippings.
“Oh, jesus…no. Fuck no.” Mournful understanding slid from his lips.
“Go,” I murmured.
He jerked his head in my direction. I expected to see a look of victory…hear him shout out a triumphant, I told you so! Instead, I saw a million questions swirling in his eyes. Max strode toward me. Without a word, he wrapped me in his arms.
