by Leah Wilde
“Here,” Vince said as he came to a stop in front of the playroom, his heart thudding loudly in his ears. He felt the rush of his blood from inside his veins, going faster and faster as he noticed a glint of intense curiosity in Fiona’s eyes.
“What…” Fiona began to say, but Vince lifted his hand to gently cut her off. She fell silent immediately, sending a rush of exhilaration down Vince’s spine that almost caused him to physically shiver. He held himself back, though. He couldn’t afford to get too easily excited, even though he felt like his skin was about ready to jump off of his body entirely just as a result of Fiona’s simple, quiet obedience.
“Before I show you this room,” Vince began, struggling to keep his voice as steady and calm as possible, “I have to get your word on something. Whatever your decision may be about the contents of this room, you cannot divulge what you see here to anybody. And I mean that. Anybody at all. If you do, and I find out, I can’t have you working for me anymore. It’s that serious.”
Fiona’s face paled a little, some of the color that had seeped into her cheeks as a result of the wine faded as she considered Vince’s words. But when she spoke, her voice was unwavering. “Okay. I understand that. I’ll be discreet.”
“Good,” Vince replied curtly, even though he felt an almost overwhelming sense of relief crash over him. He had an insurance policy, at least, that would keep Fiona from telling anybody what a freak he was. Some part of him knew that it was unfair for him to keep the job hanging over her head like a dagger, ready to drop at any moment that she did anything wrong. But it wasn’t like he wanted to fire her. If anything, he needed her much more than she needed him. She could always find another job, even if it didn’t pay quite as well as her current position. But he couldn’t find a replacement for Fiona. There was nobody else that knew the business as well as she did, nobody that knew his father the way she did. Vince really should have been fighting as hard as he could to keep her on board, especially after offending her so badly earlier in the day, but the playroom’s secrets meant more to him than the business. It meant more than the power he’d inherited from his father, more than his place in his family, and much more than the legacy of his name. He had to protect the playroom above all else.
He blew out his breath, aware that he hadn’t spoken for several seconds, which probably only heightened both of their anxieties. “I’m going to show you something that means very much to me,” Vince said softly, stepping a little closer to Fiona so he could comfortably drop his voice, even though there was nobody else in the apartment to prevent from overhearing his words. “It means…everything to me, really. I’m not saying this to scare you or freak you out or anything. I just want you to understand so that when you see it, you’ll realize how much power I’m really giving you here.”
He paused so Fiona could respond, but she didn’t say anything, even though a few wrinkles appeared in between her eyebrows and on her forehead, as if she was concentrating furiously to commit his words to memory. So Vince kept talking, forcing the words out as bravely as he could, even though he felt his fingers start to tremble even as he kept them still against his sides. “This is my playroom. This is where I…have fun.”
“Like an arcade?” Fiona asked, a slight smile spreading across her face. Somehow, though, Vince got the sense that she wasn’t mocking him. Instead, he felt like if he really did have a room full of video games and foosball tables, she would have accepted it as normal without judging him for his immaturity. He almost smiled, just picturing it.
All the same, Vince shook his head, summoning up all the courage he could find in his entire body to plunge forward into the unknown, spilling the truth out into the air around them. “No. For sex. Specifically, the kind of sex that I have.”
Fiona’s jaw dropped open for a second before she caught herself and closed it. He half-expected her to back away from him, to put some kind of distance between their bodies as a safety precaution. But she didn’t move, and she didn’t look away from him either. Instead, her eyes remained open, unflinching as she stared into his eyes. Vince took that as a good sign. She’s not scared yet, at least, he told himself as he moved to put a hand on the handle of the playroom’s door.
“I need to be in control during sex,” Vince said, and even though he managed to get the words out without allowing his voice to shake, he had to drop his eyes from Fiona’s. He just had to. There was no way he could be brave enough to look at her directly when he was spilling the deepest, darkest secret of his heart. “It’s the only way I’m satisfied. This…” He paused, gesturing to the playroom behind them, “helps me do that. I want to be clear that I never want to hurt my partners. I never want to do anything to them that they don’t want done. But this is the way I am. There’s no changing it.” He smiled sadly at the end, finally lifting his gaze again to see if there was any horror to be found on Fiona’s face. He almost lost his breath when he realized that he couldn’t detect any disapproval or disgust hiding within her eyes. “Do you have any questions?” he asked as soon as the ability to speak returned to him.
Fiona cleared her throat and nodded slowly. “Yes. A lot of them, actually.”
The back of Vince’s neck flushed. He wasn’t sure if that was a good sign or not.
“Why are you telling me this?” Fiona asked softly, blinking slowly as she continued to stare at Vince.
“That’s a fair question,” Vince admitted. He knew he hadn’t been very clear with her, even though he was working as hard as he could to force himself to be honest before things got any more serious between them than they already had. “I’ll be frank with you, Fiona. I’ve been looking to share this room with someone for a very long time, but I haven’t had much luck. Most women I meet are too timid or scared or…boring, quite honestly. It’s been a very long time since I’ve been able to be honest with anyone. So I’m trying to be up-front with you. If you’re not interested in me, in doing anything with me, then let me know now, and we can forget this conversation ever happened. I don’t want to cross any lines. But…” Vince paused again, licking his lips. “I think there’s something different about you. Something special. I think you have potential that I haven’t seen in any woman, ever. I want to see if I’m right. I want to explore you, Fiona.”
After a few seconds of silence, Fiona stepped a little closer to Vince, sending a wave of heat crashing over his head. The trembling in his fingers traveled up his arms as he fought to stay still as she got closer to him. He expected her to say something, maybe even spit in his face, but she just stared up at him wordlessly.
Vince wasn’t sure what she was telling him, but she wasn’t running away. If she was scared, her courage was apparently stronger than any fear she might have felt. More than anything, her eyes burned with some desire that made Vince feel like his very bones were shaking under his skin. She wanted to stay. That much was clear. She wanted to know what was in this room. Maybe she even wanted to know Vince.
Vince tried not to betray the surprise and the wonderful, practically crushing, relief he felt. He wanted to look like he knew that she was strong enough to take it, like he hadn’t had a single shred of doubt in his mind. “Before I show you this room, I have to set a few ground rules. Just for our safety, okay?”
Fiona nodded slowly, still looking up at him with wide, curious eyes.
“You don’t have to enter this room. I want to give you an out if you want it. You can leave right now, and we’ll never talk about this again. You’ll get to keep your job, and I won’t harass you. There will be no repercussions at all if you decide to go.”
He waited, providing a long pause where Fiona could walk away from him if she wanted to. But she didn’t move.
“If, however, you decide to come into the playroom…” Vince said, dropping his voice down to a whisper. It would have felt profane, almost sacrilegious, for him to speak louder about this. It was like a religious experience, sharing this moment, where the air seemed to crackle around them with t
he energy generated by both of their bodies. “Then that means that you will be under my power for the rest of the night. I will tell you what to do, and you will have to obey. That is, unless you use the safe word. You can pick out a word to signal to me that you do not feel safe, and I will immediately stop what I’m doing and make sure that you’re okay.”
Fiona grinned suddenly, a mischievous glint appearing in her eyes as she bit down on her bottom lip in thought. “If I can use the safe word whenever I want, doesn’t that mean I’m the one really in control?”
Vince couldn’t fight the smile that forced its way onto his face in response to her statement. “You’re right. Very good. You’re a quick student.”
Fiona shrugged bashfully. “Well, I guess you could say you’re a good teacher.”
Vince stared at her for a long moment, drinking in every last detail of her face and body before he finally spoke again. “I want to be clear with you, even though I know I’ve probably already hammered this point home enough. What happens in the playroom stays in the playroom. You can’t share this with anybody, and when we’re outside of it, we won’t discuss what happened inside. When we’re in the office, we’ll be totally professional. It has to work that way, otherwise things can get messy fast.”
“I understand,” Fiona said confidently, smiling up at him warmly. Her eyes seemed to change again, the glint of mischief from before giving way to something deeper, something less easy to read. But she was excited, Vince could discern that much at least. Her body seemed to hum with anticipation, her fingers clenching into fists at her sides like she was ready to hit something in impatience.
“Just to be clear,” Vince said, stepping impossibly closer to Fiona, until their chests almost brushed up against each other. “In there, I’m in control. I’m the boss. But at the office…you are.”
Fiona grinned, her teeth bared like a feral animal while the twinkle in her eyes danced like a newborn star. “That sounds good to me,” she whispered, sticking out the tip of her tongue between her top and bottom teeth. It took all of Vince’s willpower not to crash into her right then and there, to sweep her up into the most intense kiss of his life, but he held himself back. The playroom. It had to happen in the playroom.
“One last thing,” he added in a hoarse whisper. “We’ll sign a contract stipulating the terms of the agreement. But we can end this at any time. If you ever get tired of it…” He trailed off, not wanting to finish that statement when their relationship hadn’t even begun yet. But he had to be clear with her. She had the power to walk away from him if she wanted to, and he wouldn’t punish her for it. He didn’t want to be the type of man who hurt his partner. He wanted her to have the freedom she needed to feel powerful, too.
He waited for Fiona to respond to his statement, but even after a long pause, no verbal answer came. Instead, the grin fell from her face, replaced by a hard, solid expression that was practically undecipherable. Was she having second thoughts? Was she about to back away from this, setting Vince’s dreams on fire for the last time?
But in the next second, Fiona’s tongue poked out of the edge of her mouth, staying still for a moment before she slowly licked her lips. Shit, Vince thought, feeling his eyes go wide as she reached down and placed her hand on top of Vince’s, right over the doorknob of the playroom.
This is happening, Vince said to himself, swallowing thickly to clear the lump in his throat. This is really fucking happening.
He pulled his hand away from Fiona’s, wanting the final decision to be hers and hers alone. He expected her to hesitate, to hold back, to consider her options for one last moment.
But without any further ado, she turned the knob and pushed the door open, bravely stepping inside without waiting for Vince.
Fuck, Vince thought, breathing deeply before he followed her inside. No turning back now.
Chapter Seven
Fiona’s pulse throbbed throughout her entire body, making her feel like she was a walking, talking heart covered by a thin layer of skin. She was so wrapped up in the sensations of her own body that it took her several seconds inside the playroom before she actually looked around to absorb the reality of her surroundings. The room was all black—the walls, the floors, the ceiling, the desk in the center of the room. She felt like she was enclosed in some dark corner of a church, closed in at all sides, but she didn’t feel claustrophobic. Next, Fiona noticed long ropes hanging down from hooks on the ceiling. They were thick and black and looked rough to the touch, but on the other side of the room, there were thin ropes of silk draped across a soft-looking mat on the floor. On the far side of the room, there were steel bars of all different lengths hanging down from the walls. I wonder what those are for, Fiona thought to herself, feeling the skin at the top of her chest prickle with some mixture of excitement and fear. Finally, her eyes landed on a chest behind the mat on the floor. It almost blended into the blackness of its surroundings, but it was large and heavy, with a huge golden lock on the front. What’s in there? Fiona wondered, feeling a sharp shiver go down on her spine, almost making her physically squirm.
Fiona almost jumped when she felt two hands drop down onto her shoulders. Vince. Ridiculously, she’d almost forgotten about him as she looked around the room. Fiona stayed still, allowing his fingers to dance over her skin and travel across to her collarbone. “You’re tense,” Vince whispered behind her, his lips mere inches away from her ear. “You need to relax.”
“Yes,” Fiona agreed, bending her head to one side to give him better access to her neck.
“Yes, sir,” Vince corrected her, squeezing harder on her shoulders but not enough to cause pain. All the same, Fiona inhaled shakily and felt her muscles become even more tense and wound-up under his touch, until he pulled away a moment later.
“I’m sorry. We should discuss the contract first before I dominate you at all,” Vince said softly, stepping around Fiona so that they were facing each other. “Here, come to the desk with me.” He offered his hand forward. For a long moment, Fiona just stared down at it, unsure of what she was supposed to do before it finally clicked. She was supposed to grab his hand, of course. She didn’t know why her brain misfired so badly. Fiona guessed she was more overwhelmed by the contents of the room around her than she originally thought. She finally placed her hand into Vince’s, feeling her skin tingle a little bit where his fingers touched hers.
Vince gently pulled her along to the center of the room, where the small black desk with a matching chair awaited them. There, on the center of the table, was a stack of white papers, clashing against the otherwise overwhelming darkness of the playroom. “That’s for you,” Vince said as he let go of Fiona’s hand, pulling out the chair from the desk and wordlessly gesturing for her to sit. “Read it well before you sign.”
“Are we going to…?” Fiona trailed off, tearing her eyes away from Vince to stare down at the contract on the table.
“Fuck? Not tonight,” Vince said. “I need you to be absolutely sure about things first. We’ll do it another night, after we’ve both signed the contract. For now, just read it thoroughly. Really think about what you’re doing here. When you’re finished, either way, a car will be waiting for you outside.”
Before Fiona had a chance to say anything in response, Vince leaned over her and dropped a soft, gentle kiss on the top of her head before walking away, quickly receding from the playroom and shutting the door behind him.
Fiona cleared her throat, taking a long look at the various ropes and bars that hung down from the walls and ceiling, before turning to the stack of papers before her. She licked the edge of one of her fingers to flip the top page off the pile and began reading from the proper beginning of the contract. After skimming through a few lines of dense legal jargon, she got to the good stuff. The real terms of their agreement read as follows: “Before any sessions in the playroom, the Sub will decide on a safe word, which the Sub will write in the following blank space at the bottom of this page. It is essential th
at the safe word be distinctive and unique—it cannot be a normal word regularly used in typical conversation outside of the playroom. It must be special enough that the Dom will immediately know to stop the session and tend to the Sub. It must be something that the Sub will remember.”
Fiona paused to think about what word she should choose. Her mind absurdly went straight for various food items: banana, broccoli, asparagus, tangerine... “That one is as good as any,” she said out loud to herself as she picked up the pen and wrote “tangerine” neatly and clearly at the designated space at the bottom of the page. She then flipped on to the next page and read on, mouthing the words silently as she went.
