by Piper Scott
“The people who frequent The Shepherd have a lot to say about who I really am.” Sterling spoke loudly enough so Adrian could hear him, but not so loudly that he would disrupt Gabriel down the hall. “They claim that I collect young men in my penthouse in harems, or that I’m dating Clarissa.”
“Mm.” Adrian had nothing more to say than that. Sterling’s thumbs worked out knots in his muscles he hadn’t realized had been bothering him.
“Everyone makes the assumption that because I’m the man in charge, I’m the one who’s going to be the most darkly involved in the lifestyle—that for me, it’s whips and chains and ball gags or nothing at all.”
The constant, circular motion of Sterling’s hands guided Adrian’s troubled mind back into his body. As the oil worked into his skin and the fragrance filled his nostrils, he listened to the rhythm of his heart and remarked the rise and fall of his chest. They were small, simple pleasures, and Adrian had never thought to cherish them before.
Now he knew better.
“But I think what they don’t understand is that life is more nuanced than they give it credit for.” One of Sterling’s hands left Adrian’s shoulder, and the other gripped him firmly and tugged. Adrian followed Sterling’s lead and rolled over, settling on his stomach. Once he was comfortable, Sterling straddled his hips. Room-temperature oil pooled on the small of Adrian’s back, and Adrian had to stifle a moan into Sterling’s pillow. All of his joints relaxed, and the first of the tethers his mind had on his body started to come undone.
Why was this so good?
“The Shepherd is my vision, and it serves a community that I adore, but it’s as much for them as it is for me.” Sterling’s fingers dipped into the reservoir of oil, then traced along the dip of Adrian’s spine. All Adrian could do was lie still and take it. He groaned into the pillow, overcome by the care Sterling took of his body. No one had ever treated him like this before, and Adrian still couldn’t convince himself that what he felt was real. Something as simple as fingertips running up his spine shouldn’t have been able to disarm him like that, but there was no denying that they had.
His mind pulled further away from his body, negativity overruled by genuine affection.
“When I was younger and wilder, some of the more ludicrous claims might not have been far from the truth. There was a time in my life when I moved from lover to lover, when I mastered pain and forced every dewy-eyed submissive I came across to his knees.” Sterling’s fingers branched out, and Adrian trembled as he worked them against his muscles. The dull, throbbing pain Sterling expelled from his body ached, but the pain was pleasure—it was the promise that after Sterling was finished, Adrian would feel better than he ever had before. “But I’m older now. The Shepherd first opened seventeen years ago, I’m going to be turning forty next year, and the man I am now isn’t the man I was then.”
“Mm.” Forty. Forty was a good number. Adrian’s brain fogged at the thought of it. Forty was the right age to settle down, to find a partner, and to raise a family. He could give that to Sterling, if that was what Sterling wanted.
The anxious, negative part of Adrian’s mind that would have dismissed the thought as foolish was hushed. He didn’t miss it.
“Anyone can inflict pain, Adrian.” Sterling’s fingers rubbed the kinks from Adrian’s back, and all Adrian wanted to do was let Sterling touch him like this forever. “Anyone can tie a boy up, deny him, forbid him from acting, and harm him until he’s flying so high, he thinks he’ll never come down… but do you know what’s so much harder than that?”
“No.” Adrian’s shoulders slumped. The bed seemed to rise up to swallow him—or was it simply that his body was melting into it? He couldn’t tell. “What?”
“What’s so much harder is bringing a submissive into a state of subspace without punishment. The body is naturally inclined to protect itself from danger, and the mind is quick to let go when it needs to. There are Doms out there who will use that to their advantage, and who think that it’s okay to mistreat a boy because he likes it.”
“Mm.” Adrian wanted to turn his head to the side, but he couldn’t find the strength. With nothing more than scented massage oil and his fingers, Sterling owned him.
Adrian once controlled Sterling with pain. Now, Sterling controlled Adrian with pleasure.
“So to me, the progression was natural. If I’d already mastered pain, why not move on to pleasure? Why not dominate a man with such sensuous kindness and praise that he finds subspace without any painful external stimuli? To me, that is the ultimate mark of mastery.”
There had to be a contact drug in the massage oil that Sterling used, or a trick in the way he worked Adrian’s muscles that could turn a man to mush, because it was too good to be true. Adrian couldn’t move. Each shallow breath filled him, but each exhale made him question whether he’d be able to draw another breath. The relaxation seeped from his muscles through his bones. It pooled in Adrian’s stomach and coated the lining of his lungs. It rose up his throat and spread down into his gut.
And when that feeling reached his cock, all Adrian could do was push himself meekly against the mattress and hope that the friction was enough.
He’d never been so helpless before, not even when he was tied up and at the mercy of another man, and Sterling hadn’t done anything more than lay him on his stomach.
“And now, here you are.” Sterling’s voice was hot against the back of Adrian’s ear. Adrian pushed down into the mattress, trying to sate the arousal Sterling’s proximity stirred in him. “Abrasive. Angry. Quick to lash out… and I’m going to ruin you. I’m going to tear down every board you’ve put up to barricade yourself from the rest of the world, and I’m going to do it without laying a hand on you. And when you’re bared and vulnerable, I’m going to show you what it means to truly submit.”
The pitched noise that rolled from Adrian’s tongue only to be swallowed by the pillows wasn’t voluntary. His hands found purchase, and he grasped the sheets in front of him until his knuckles protested and his body relaxed once more. Sterling’s hands worked over his shoulders, then down his sides. When he started to knead into Adrian’s hips, Adrian couldn’t help himself anymore.
He sobbed.
It wasn’t pain, or distress, or discomfort that brought him to do it. It wasn’t the fear of crumpling to the kind of man he’d spent his adult life dominating and destroying, either. It was because, for the first time since Gabriel had disappeared, Adrian was letting go.
There was no more guilt. There was no more disappointment.
Under Sterling’s hands, he was worthy of forgiveness.
“You’re almost there, Adrian,” Sterling whispered. His fingers dipped into the shallow reservoir of oil on the small of Adrian’s back and rubbed it in circles along Adrian’s hips. “You’re so close. I can hear it—I can hear you letting go. You deserve this. You don’t have to suffer—not as long as I’m here.”
Another sob racked Adrian’s chest, rattling his ribs and choking his throat. All this time he’d believed Sterling was weak, but the reality was anything but. Sterling was strong in all the ways that Adrian wasn’t.
And in all the ways Adrian could never be.
The same hands that had worked his body so lovingly slid the pajama bottoms from Adrian’s hips, then brought what little was left of the massage oil down to rub into Adrian’s exposed cheeks. Adrian found the strength to push up against them for a brief moment before his body gave out, and he landed back on the mattress. His aching cock rubbed against the bedsheets, and he shifted his thighs in small ways to try to keep that feeling alive.
“You’re different, and you’re misunderstood, and that’s okay.” Sterling’s fingers kneaded Adrian’s ass, kind instead of cruel. The same wild chemistry between them when they’d first met was present now, but it was changed. No longer was it frantic and greedy—over time, it had mellowed and grown stronger, but it was far from understated. It vibrated in Adrian’s heart and tightened his
stomach. But best of all, it unraveled and expanded in his mind, pushing the limits of his universe until he was as broad and vast as eternity itself.
All because of Sterling, the way he touched him, and the things he said.
“You don’t have to bottle it all up. You don’t have to be so strong. Let me be strong for you. Let me share the weight. You deserve so much more than what you give yourself. You deserve to be free.”
“I deserve to be free.” Adrian’s mouth tasted like tears, and he swallowed back the saline bitterly. He’d said the words, but they still didn’t feel real.
If he could just let go, if he could just accept it…
Sterling’s hands gently tugged the globes of Adrian’s ass apart. The bed shifted. Sterling nuzzled against the inside of Adrian’s thigh with his cheek, then moved again. It wasn’t until Adrian felt the wet, firm pressure of something warm against his entrance that he realized what was happening.
With a breathless cry, he buried his face into the pillows and squeezed his eyes shut.
Sterling’s tongue worked in slow circles around Adrian’s hole. Sometimes it pushed, creating pleasure so tantalizing that Adrian had to stop himself from thrusting back and riding Sterling’s tongue. At other times, its presence was so light it almost wasn’t there. The wetness Sterling left behind chilled Adrian’s skin when he drew breath, then heated with each exhalation. The temperature play was subtle, but Sterling had coaxed Adrian’s brain to pay attention to his body, and now he felt every little thing like it was something much larger than it was.
“Say it again,” Sterling uttered. His voice warmed the slick along Adrian’s ass.
Adrian shivered. “I deserve to be free.”
“Again.”
“I deserve to be free.”
“Again.”
“I deserve to be free!”
The pillows dampened Adrian’s scream, but nothing could hold back the fire in his soul. It scorched the pain to ash and cauterized the open wounds he still suffered from. The blaze consumed, eating him up from the inside out, spreading from the clenched point in his stomach until he was full of it, and it was full of him.
Sterling’s tongue pushed, and pleasure exploded behind Adrian’s eyes. He gasped and groaned and pushed himself into the bed, too strung out from ecstasy to care how much noise he made.
What he needed now—all he needed now—was Sterling.
“Take me,” Adrian begged. His voice was foreign to him now, too desperate and unchained to belong to his throat. “Please, please take me.”
Sterling’s tongue didn’t stop. Adrian crushed his face into the pillows and screamed. Legs spread, body struggling between utter relaxation and total tension, his cock jerked, and he came.
“Sterling,” Adrian squeaked. His balls tightened, and cum leaked from his slit and dripped onto the bedding. “Sterling, please. Please.”
Orgasm had arrived, but Adrian wasn’t satisfied. An emptiness filled him, taking up space beneath his too-tight stomach and the unending bliss in his groin. Until it was filled, he couldn’t rest.
He needed to share with Sterling the same satisfaction that Sterling had given him.
“Sterling!”
The hot tongue didn’t stop.
“Master.” Adrian croaked the word, delirious with pleasure. “Master, please. Please. I need you. I need you right now.”
The tongue stopped. The bed shifted.
Adrian got what he wanted.
20
Sterling
Sterling mounted Adrian. His broad hands found their way to Adrian’s hips and propped Adrian into position. Beneath him, Adrian cried out in fragmented, nonsensical ways into the pillows.
Master.
The word was magic. Two simple syllables shifted Sterling’s world in an instant.
The same Adrian who’d been so terrified to let himself experience pleasure that he’d clung incessantly to pain was now beneath him, begging to be owned. The young man who’d defied Sterling without a second thought now crumpled before him.
Sometimes, pain wasn’t the answer. Sometimes, understanding was enough.
Sterling reached through the dark for the bottle of lube he’d placed near the massage oil. His fingers found rounded plastic. The click of the cap rang through the room, a complement to the stifled moans from the man beneath him.
“Master,” Adrian whimpered. He lifted his hips, easing the pressure on Sterling’s hand. More than anything, Sterling wished he could see the curves of Adrian’s tight ass. How pretty he’d look with it in the air, narrow thighs quivering as he struggled to support his own weight.
And how much prettier he’d look with Sterling’s dick buried deep inside of him.
Sterling allowed the lube to pool in his hand, then introduced it to his shaft. Slick, cool fluid coated his skin, and when there was nothing else to cover, Sterling spread the rest across Adrian’s hole.
“You have to remember to be quiet.” Sterling’s fingers traced in teasing circles around Adrian’s hole. “If you’re not quiet, we’ll be caught. You don’t want that, do you?”
Adrian moaned, but he said nothing.
“You can do that for me, can’t you?”
This time there was no response.
Perfect.
Sterling smoothed his free hand around the curve of Adrian’s ass, then pushed forward with his hips so his shaft slid along Adrian’s taint. Adrian’s breathing hitched, and the small, delighted sound he made spurred Sterling onward. He found Adrian’s teased hole with the head of his cock and caressed it only long enough to make Adrian doubt if he’d follow through.
But follow through he did.
A single push of his hips allowed the tip of Sterling’s cock to stretch Adrian open. Adrian quivered, but he maintained his position. It was only when Sterling pushed inward and lodged his head behind Adrian’s ring that Adrian’s body slumped.
By then, Adrian had already done all that Sterling needed him to.
Sterling took possession of his body. Hands on Adrian’s hips, he pushed deeper, and deeper, until there was nowhere else to go. Balls flush against Adrian’s ass, Sterling ground his hips and let Adrian feel his every inch.
“Do you remember how you took from me last time?” Sterling pulled back only to slide in again, determined to make Adrian feel what they shared. It was important that Adrian remembered this—Sterling needed him to make positive associations.
He needed Adrian to let go of what was broken so he could embrace something new.
“Yes.” Adrian tried to lift his hips, but his legs gave out. Sterling caught him before he could fall, and he slid into Adrian anew.
The mewl that parted from Adrian’s lips was worth the moment lost.
“Now I want you to see how it feels to receive.”
Another thrust recovered the ground lost, and Sterling hung his head and held his breath as pleasure consumed him. Adrian’s body was tight, and the way he knew to clench and release drove Sterling crazy. Holding back was hard, but he restrained himself for Adrian’s pleasure.
For tonight, for as long as Adrian allowed himself to let go, Sterling would shower him in the adoration he deserved.
The shifting of bedsheets beneath their knees and the tiny moans Adrian allowed himself to indulge in marked the passage of time. Sterling dove into him, feeling him stretch and squeeze. Every time Adrian’s pleasure peaked, he squeezed down around Sterling and pushed a tiny, upward sound from between his teeth. No matter how much time passed, Sterling would never tire of that noise.
“Where are you, Adrian?” Sterling’s words were strained, his orgasm one twitch of Adrian’s hips away. It’d been three months—three long months—since they’d shared their bodies with each other, and Sterling struggled to hold back. “Tell me where you are.”
“Flying, Master.”
Fuck.
“You’ll come for me again.” Sterling’s hand snaked beneath Adrian’s body, grasping his rigid cock. He knew Ad
rian hadn’t come all that long ago, and it turned him on to no end that Adrian was ready to go again. As he stroked, he continued to speak. “You’ll come all over the bed. I want these sheets filthy with what you do to them. When I wake up tomorrow morning, I want to be able to remember everything you took, and I want you to remember what a good boy you were for me.”
Adrian gasped. The sound cut through the bedroom, and for a second, Sterling was afraid that it had come from Gabriel. But the lights stayed off, and the shadows in the room didn’t shift. They were alone.
“So be a good boy for me.” Sterling stroked his thumb over the head of Adrian’s cock as he thrust in deep. Precum smeared across his skin, and he used it to lubricate Adrian’s shaft. “Come. I want you to come.”
The bond between them was so recently developed that Sterling knew it was a long shot. Asking for an untrained submissive to come on command was a fantasy seldom realized—but with Adrian, who’d been visiting The Shepherd for years, there was a chance, and Sterling took it.
He was rewarded for his risk.
Adrian’s body shook. Sterling felt his hips shift, and as he fisted Adrian’s cock he felt the first twitch. The muffled cries that marked Adrian’s pleasure were primal, but muted by necessity. The frantic sound of them brought Sterling right to the edge, and as Adrian’s body clenched around him, he let himself fall.
Orgasm squeezed Sterling’s gut. With a rasped grunt, he buried himself in Adrian and let himself go. Cum pulsed through him. His knot swelled. Adrian’s body stretched to accommodate him as best it could, but there was no way it could stretch far enough to let Sterling slide out from inside of him.
They were stuck.
Half of Adrian’s body collapsed onto the bed—Sterling heard the plop as his chest hit the mattress heavily. The other half was pressed closer to Sterling, fitting his knot as deeply as it could go to try to relieve some of the pressure from his overworked ring. Sterling held him there, allowing Adrian’s legs to slump.
“Good. So good.” Sterling didn’t allow himself to sound breathless. Right now, his needs came second to Adrian’s. “Do you have any idea how impressive that is? How perfect you are?”
