by L. DuBois
The smart thing to do would be to walk away from the club. If she went to the overseers and told them she couldn’t risk participating, they would cite the club’s very strict non-disclosure agreements, privacy, and security protocols, all of which meant her privacy was safe with them. If she still protested, Master Mikel would demand to know if she trusted him.
If they wouldn’t allow her to skip the game, she could relinquish her membership and perhaps hire a discreet professional to top her once or twice a month.
But the game, well, it sounded dangerous and fun. An unknown partner, an assigned list of kinks, toys, and positions…it was the right kind of depraved.
The smart thing would be to leave, to accept that playing could result in a situation where she was out in the public sections of the clubs, where…people…might see her.
Be smart or be stupid.
Risk nothing but lose access to the emotional outlet of BDSM, or do the stupid thing, and play.
Cali picked up the cuffs—manacles—again. The note that came with the items hadn’t said what their letter was. She’d considered C for cuffs, or G for gag, but she had a vague memory of bit-style gags often being referred to as “mouth bits.” In theory that would put them under M, and once she focused on that letter the archaic word ‘manacles’ popped into her head.
Cupping one of the heavy, stiff-hinged manacles in her right hand she slid it around her left wrist, then hesitated. Whomever sent these hadn’t included a key. Once they were locked in place she wouldn’t have the ability to remove them on her own.
She should be smart and leave.
But she needed to submit.
Cali clicked the manacle closed around her wrist. Thick, bittersweet arousal slid down the back of her throat. It was like drinking hot chocolate—the real stuff with spices, made of cacao.
She pulled on the chain, listening to the clanks as she drew it onto her lap. The second manacle was still open, the hinges stiff enough that moving it around hadn’t caused it to close and lock.
Experimentally, Cali slid her wrist into the open jaws, but paused, looking at the length of the chain and then at the mouth bit.
Picking up the gag, she carefully placed the rubber stick between her teeth. It hadn’t looked all that big, but once in her mouth she could feel the strain on her jaw. Adjusting it forward so it was against the back of her front teeth, she reached back and fumbled with the straps. Her hair got caught several times, but she buckled it, then pulled her hair out from under the straps, careful since she had glue-in extensions that made her just-past-shoulder length hair fall all the way to the small of her back. Pulling the locks forward she braided her hair, letting the loose braid hang as she grabbed the other manacle.
The click as it locked closed was quiet, but she shivered, that warm, dark feeling intensifying.
Cali rose, sliding into the dressing room area where a long counter held glass jars with cotton balls, bandages, razors, deodorant, and a plethora of other things members might need. There were also small glass jars filled with hair ties, hair spray, and bobby pins among the other supplies.
A few people looked her way, the clank of the chain drawing attention, as she redid and fastened her braid. She didn’t like everyone looking at her, but they were looking at the bit and manacles, not staring at her face with that quizzical “do I know you from somewhere” expression.
Cali formed her thumbs and index fingers into a letter “M” then raised one shoulder in question. The women who’d looked over nodded and some gave her an encouraging little smile.
Pushing her braid back over her shoulder, Cali checked the clock on the wall, and then hurried out. It wouldn’t do to be late for her imprisonment.
Of the three playroom courtyards, the Iron Court was the one she’d used the most. It had the most extreme rooms, and was the least regularly used, except by a select few. It was also furthest from the large main courtyard which had the public areas—the library and dining room. Due to both distance and use, the Iron Court offered the most privacy.
She wished she’d left earlier. There were plenty of things to see, places she could have lingered in the shadows to be voyeuristic. On the other hand, it was fun to be a little anxious about being late. She enjoyed the way her heart rate increased, the nerves that quickened her bare-footed steps over the tile and flagstone floors.
Finally she emerged from the short covered hallway that linked the buildings and into the Iron Court. While the other courtyards had carefully maintained greenery, the Iron Court held a garden of statuary.
Stone and metal sculptures depicted figures in bondage—a stone woman banded in black metal, a bronze male figure wound tight with chain.
None of the sculptures were life-like, but there was still a quick blip of fear, a hind-brain awareness of potential danger, every time she hit this point. A sense that she was now facing a mob of dangerous and depraved individuals.
Her kind of people.
A light breeze rustled the night, but in the Iron Court the only thing that moved were the wisps of hair along her cheeks. Her latex shorts and tank top were skin-tight, with no loose hems to flutter.
Cali stepped out of the shadows at the covered entrance, and into the torchlight that lit the statuary garden. Like all the other courtyards, a covered hallway ringed the open center, off of which there were half a dozen doors. Each led to a playroom equipped for some of the most brutal kinds of BDSM play. The torches on each support post added to the pseudo-medieval dungeon feel of the place.
There was no one else there. Just her and the statues. The nervous anticipation she’d been enjoying on the walk tightened and condensed, becoming something hard and sharp-edged inside her.
Cali reached up, adjusted the bit, and started walking, the crushed stone occasionally sharp but not unbearable under her bare feet.
The man stepped out from behind the largest of the statues—a couple roughly carved from a single huge piece of stone. The statue woman’s back was against the man’s chest, his hand under her chin. Metal rings through the female statue’s nipples and plump vulva provided tie points for outdoor bondage.
Cali jumped, a muffled exclamation of shock and fear escaping from around the gag.
The man’s face was in shadow, but when he spoke she reeled back.
“You’re here to be assessed as a slave.”
Cali shook her head and reached for the bit, prepared to take it out so she could talk, because this was not happening.
Anyone but him.
You knew it was a possibility. You knew it might be him, knew and still you decided to participate.
Indecision held her immobile. There shouldn’t be any indecision. She should walk away right now.
He was giving her time to leave. Keeping his distance, too.
Damn him, and damn her for not walking away.
It was the height of self-destructive stupidity, but she dropped her hands from the gag.
He waited another few seconds, before finally speaking.
“Your normal safe word and hand signal will completely end both the role play we’ll be using, and whichever scene we’re engaged in.”
She inhaled deeply, fingers pressing into her thighs. That voice, a voice both familiar and forgotten, made her want to bow her head, to let go and submit.
“You will have a secondary safe word—milk—which will act like yellow in the stoplight system.” His accent was light, but still there, giving his words even more weight than they already had. “It will pause the scene we’re engaged in, and I will assess your mental, physical and emotional states, but we will maintain the role play, unless I decide we need to set it aside temporarily.”
Cali slowly shifted her weight, the chain clanking softly. Role play.
Yes, this would be okay, because it wouldn’t be them playing…they’d each be playing a part. That inserted emotional distance.
His shadowy figure didn’t speak for several moments. The silence wasn’t uncomfortable
, but rather…patient.
“Welcome, slave.” The words were dark and dangerous. “Your owner has sent you to me to be assessed. Tested.”
Cali looked away—down and to the side. It wasn’t exactly lowering her eyes submissively, but it was close. With one of her regular Doms she would already be on her knees, enjoying the bite of pain as the tiny bits of stone dug into her skin.
“How you play it is up to you,” he said. “If you want to fight me, I will bind you tight, and eliminate all your choices.
“If you choose to be obedient, or willing, but scared—I will both use you and comfort you. Praise you.
“And if you choose to be well trained, already broken to a Master’s command, I will push your limits.”
There was a brief pause, before he said. “Our letter is M.”
She nodded to indicate she’d figured that much out.
“There are things on our list which you said you were willing to try but which I know will make you profoundly uncomfortable. They will happen no matter which characterization you choose.”
Cali’s eyes closed, and the shiver that raced down her back was one of both fear and need.
Another long silence, during which she rolled her shoulders, not because she was nervous, but because she wanted to limber up.
The scratch of shoes brought her gaze up. Zidan stepped into the light.
He wasn’t handsome, but he was striking. A Middle Eastern man with hawkish features—straight thick black brows, a narrow nose, and high cheekbones, he looked dark and dangerous. A wizard conjuring dark magic, or a supervillian whose justifications actually made him more sympathetic than the law-and-order hero.
He’d written both those characters before.
Zidan Ghaffari raised his hand and crooked his finger at her.
Cali took a step forward. Zidan reached out and down, catching the chain between her manacles. His fingers brushed her bare thighs as he did, and the shock of his warm hand against her cool skin made her breath catch.
Then Zidan started walking, leading her between the looming statues, into the shadowed hallway. Then he opened a playroom door, and pulled her into the darkness beyond.
Chapter 2
The door closed behind them, sealing out the torchlight.
She could feel Zidan, as if she had a sixth sense that told her where he was. In reality it was the heat of his body and the nearly inaudible sounds of his shoes on the concrete floor that told her where he was in the dark room.
After a moment her eyes adjusted. It wasn’t full dark. There was a flickering, dim light coming from somewhere in the back of the room. She’d been in each of the different Iron Court rooms before, but that didn’t mean much, as each of the rooms had plenty of different options for play. What the room became was really up to the Dom.
What room, what equipment, toys, and implements would Zidan choose in order to assess a “slave”?
The concept, the word, was abhorrent. But within these walls, it had a different meaning. Anyone at Las Palmas who used it knew it was far from literal, and here a “slave” was protected by all the strictures, rules, and implied caveats of BDSM. There were even a few members who had Master/slave relationships. Those were primarily between long term, bonded couples. Most notable was Master Carter and his slave “pet.”
If he hadn’t confirmed M was their letter, she might have wondered if it was “S” and the manacles and mouth bit were just being used as props for “sexual slavery,” or maybe “slave auction.”
She glanced at Zidan—a black outline moving against the faint brown-toned shadows.
Light clicked on, bright and blinding. Cali threw an arm up, shielding her eyes. The chain clanked against her chest, and she remembered at the last moment not to bring her arm too close to her face in case she smacked herself with the manacle.
When the light coming through her eyelids no longer hurt, she lowered her arm, then slowly opened her eyes.
And jerked back, her shoulder blades hitting the rough stucco wall beside the door.
Most of the rooms in this court had stucco walls rather than smooth painted drywall. Dark-stained wooden panels were mounted to the walls at even intervals, each larger than a door, and some with cup hooks or o-rings bolted to them to provide tops with options.
But this room had something she hadn’t seen before. Something she hadn’t expected.
In the center of the room, under a massive circular surgical light was a doctor’s exam table. Instead of a bland tan or pale blue, the padded, sectioned top was covered in black vinyl. The base was a cream-colored plastic, with drawers in it, and there was a gray electric foot pedal sitting on the terracotta tile floor. There were also black leather straps dangling from the underside of the padded top.
It looked like someone had taken a real exam table and doctored it—har har—to make it appropriate for BDSM play. She knew she’d been in this room before but hadn’t seen the medical exam table. She would have remembered. But then again, at any given time there were plenty of things subs didn’t get to see. The corners of this room, and all the others she’d been in, were occupied by black-draped masses—unused equipment. When not in use, smaller things were stored in the person-sized cages that were a standard amenity in each Iron Court room.
“‘Medical scenes’ is a broad idea, with a variety of possible interpretations.” Zidan brushed an unseen something off the corner of the exam table.
Medical play. When she guessed that M was their letter, posited what the other items might be, medical play hadn’t been one she thought of. She’d come up with misbehaving, massage, and mummification.
Medical play…a medical exam?…that hadn’t occurred to her.
“Since your checklist indicated only ‘willing to try’ for medical scenes, I decided to go with the most mundane.” Zidan glanced her way, his gaze running up and down her body. “A complete physical exam.”
He was going to strap her down to that table and look over every inch of her body. Her breath caught, even as her internal voice, in a calm, detached tone, pointed out that this wasn’t all that different to what would happen at the start of most scenes. A visual “exam”—though it usually wasn’t referred to as such—was often the first thing a good Dom did. To please themselves, perhaps because it helped the sub find the right headspace, but also to check for any bruises or tender spots they should avoid.
Zidan turned to fully face her. His head tipped to the side and down, so he was looking at her through thick lashes and lowered brows. It was a look she knew well. A look that was nearly a signature for him.
Reality wanted to intrude. If this was Cali scening with Zidan, there were things she’d say. Simple things, but also darker, angry things.
That’s why he sent a gag.
But this wasn’t Cali and Zidan. It was a master and an unnamed slave.
“Come here.”
As she walked towards the exam table, Cali put up a thin emotional screen inside her mind. It wasn’t Cali who would be strapped down on that table, but the slave she was playing. He’d given her several possible takes on this particular role, but as she walked up to him, she hadn’t yet decided which she’d take.
“Up.” He patted the table.
She could have resisted then, but she turned her back to the bench, her shoulder brushing his. Standing on her toes she wasn’t quite tall enough to slide up, so she planted the palms of her hands beside her hips, the chain tight across her body, the cold of the heavy metal making her shiver even through the thin barrier of latex. Her nipples were visible under the latex of the tank top, and she felt his gaze drop to her breasts.
With a little hop she seated herself, then rested her wrists, bound in the heavy manacles, on her thighs.
“You were well trained,” Zidan said. He grabbed the bit, tugging it out of her mouth—the straps digging in to her neck—and dropping it to dangle against her collarbone.
Cali inhaled, closed her eyes, then exhaled. She locked away t
he tangled ball of emotion that Zidan had knotted within her the instant he appeared.
When she opened her eyes, she kept her gaze submissively lowered and leaned in to the part she was playing. “Thank you, Master.”
He made a pleased sound, then said. “You may call me Master Z. And for brevities’ sake, you may also call me simply ‘Sir’ when needed.”
“Thank you, Master Z.”
He gripped her chin, underhanded, and lifted her face. She glanced once at him, then lowered her lashes, which meant practically closing her eyes since he had her chin raised.
“Time for your exam.”
That was all the warning she got before he reached out and grabbed her breast, squeezing just hard enough that her shoulders rounded and she leaned away from him.
“Chest out. Those breasts are mine to play with if I want to.” His voice was hard, cracking with both command and disapproval.
“You’re not my Master,” Cali snapped back.
A sharp lance of pain pierced the wall she’d put up in her mind. Those words were too close to some truths that had no place here.
“You’re right,” Zidan—no, Master Z—said slowly. “But I am a Master. The Master who has custody of you, and whom you will obey.”
She flinched at the last word, then slowly straightened her spine. Shoulders back, chest out, she waited for him to touch her.
Master Z pinched her nipple, giving it a warning tug, before he lost his grip on the slick latex. He slapped her other breast. She hissed out a breath, though it hadn’t hurt, and managed to keep her posture.
“Obedient, but not totally so.” Master Z grabbed her knees and forced her legs open, spreading her wide. Her heavy wrists stayed on her thighs, but the chain dropped down between her legs, poised on the edge of the table, then fell off the edge, clanking. The manacles pulled on her wrists, the weight uncomfortable and unfamiliar.
