Bonds of Trust Read online

  She didn’t even know if she wanted to wear his collar. She’d seen them on other submissives in the club and had never thought she’d be into that level of claiming. A visual tag of ownership that could be viewed as both empowering and demeaning, depending on who was looking.

  Cali smoothed a moist palm down the seam of the strapless bustier, the leather soft and supple against her skin. The restrictive garment kept her from taking the deep breath she desperately needed, but the constriction reminded her of why she was wearing the outfit. Because Jake wanted her to.

  She’d been led to an office this time and her attention strayed once again to the wall of screens that revealed every area of the club. Every area. The amount of visual information displayed so openly had at first shocked then stimulated her. The variety of Scenes and images shown blew her still vanilla mind. Gags and whips, bondage and blindfolds, couples, trios, hetero, homo—you name it, it was presented before her in full-colored detail. The breadth and scope of activity was what truly shocked her. She’d had no idea the extent of the club’s offerings.

  Did Jake participate in all of it?

  Would he make her some day?

  The thought was both frightening and tantalizing.

  The sudden intrusion of the booming club music had her whipping away from the cameras, the guilt at being caught watching flushing her cheeks. Jake stopped in the doorway, his slow, admiring visual caress over her body heating her until she thought she’d melt.

  “You look stunning.” His voice washed over her with his gaze. She’d followed the instructions he’d included in his package, down to the last detail. It soothed her to know she’d pleased him.

  “Thank you.” She clasped her hands before her to keep from fidgeting with the hem of the impossibly short leather skirt. The urge to tug it down was almost irresistible.

  He stepped into the room, the loud beat of music abruptly cutting off when he shut the door. His boots thumped as he moved in front of her. He wore black, as always, only tonight he had on a silk button-down shirt that made him appear dressed up.

  He ran a finger over her throat, the light stroke sending tingles of anticipation through her. She’d twisted her hair up tonight, as he’d instructed, leaving her neck exposed. His eyes followed the back and forth movement of his finger as it caressed her skin. He appeared contemplative, like he was uncertain about something. It was a look she’d never seen on him before.

  “Are you okay?”

  His focus shot back to her. “Why do you ask?”

  “You seem, I don’t know,” she said, a little hesitant. “Worried.” She reached up and rubbed her thumb over the creases etched into his forehead.

  He jerked away from her touch, leaving her hand hanging awkwardly in the air. “I’m fine,” he said, the sharp bite of his words a verbal slap at her concern. “Let’s go.” He grabbed her dangling hand and pulled her behind him out the door.

  Surprised, she stumbled after him down the long hallway, trying to walk as quickly as possible, given the height of her heels and short skirt. What was up with him? He’d never treated her like this. Abruptly she stopped and yanked on his hand.

  He spun, anger flashing in his eyes before he had her pinned against the wall, her wrists held tightly over her head. Her heart rate spiked, an instant flash of fear coursing through her.

  “Do you question me, Cali?”

  Yes. Right now she did. But she trusted him. Whatever was wrong, she trusted him not to harm her. “No,” she finally answered, her gaze stubbornly anchored to his collarbone.

  He inhaled and she watched his pulse pound short, sharp beats on his throat. “Good.” He let her hands drop but kept them bound tightly in one of his. “You owe me for that act of insubordination. Now, let’s go.”

  She followed him, head down, as he led her through the crowd of people filling the main floor. Was this a new test? To see if she’d question his authority in front of others? She wasn’t sure, but she knew enough not to do that. Her only concern now was to keep from angering him further. To ease the ball of angst settling in her gut. A sensation she hadn’t felt since she’d agreed to be his sub.

  “Good evening, Master Jake,” someone called out as they passed by.

  “Master Jake,” another voice purred.

  “Sir, sir,” yet another voice begged. “Are you taking clients again?”

  Jake ignored them all.

  He finally stopped when they’d reached the second floor. His gaze traveled the length of the open room until it settled on an open piece of equipment. A slow, almost devious smile crept over his lips. Nervous fear rolled in her as he moved into the Dungeon, the open space made available for public displays of Dominance and submission. The room she’d only seen once.

  Did he really mean to do a Scene here?

  She stumbled, her heels catching against each other as she tried to process Jake’s intentions. Up ’til now, they’d only done private Scenes. She didn’t think she could do one in front of others.

  Where anyone could see her.

  Suddenly she was in his arms. Jake’s warmth surrounded her. Protecting her.

  “You can do this,” he reassured her. His breath caressed her ear. “I want you to do this.”

  Her eyes were clenched tight as she willed her heartbeat to slow. The cries and moans filling the room blended with the thumps, smacks and hisses of equipment and the heady scent of arousal and sweat until it all roared in her head.

  “Trust me,” Jake breathed, stroking her back in gentle, soothing motions. “You need this. Trust me.”

  Again. Those two words. Trust me.

  One breath. Two breaths. Slow, calming breaths. Not that she was even close to calm. But they helped.

  He stepped back enough to lift her chin up so she could see him. “Same rules apply as always. Use your safe word and we stop now.”

  That knowledge alone finally seemed to quiet her nerves. She could stop this whenever she wanted.

  “Okay,” she said, his silver-gray eyes holding her steady. “Green.”

  The flash of approval was all she needed to follow through. The Scene prep proceeded quickly from there. Maybe it was the fog clouding her mind from the fear she’d banked back or the fact that it all felt surreal, like it was happening to someone else. But in what seemed like seconds, Cali found herself strapped, spread-eagle, to a St. Andrew’s Cross on full display to everyone in the room.

  “Eyes open,” Jake ordered. “Focus on me, Cali.”

  She obeyed. “Yes, Jake.”

  He stood before her, toying with the front zipper of her bustier. The warmth of his attention contrasted with the cool, hard surface of the metal at her back and the stiff, scratchy leather cuffs on her wrists and ankles.

  Her breaths were short and constricted within the confines of the garment. The slow rasp of the zipper precluded the cool flush of air that met her skin. Jake watched her reaction as her breasts were exposed to everyone. One gulping breath of air filled her lungs as the restriction was removed. Her muscles tightened, pulling on the chains binding her wrists until they clanged menacingly against their brackets.

  “Beautiful,” Jake said, the reverence clear in this low voice. His fingers flick over the nipple clamps she’d been wearing under the bustier. He took a second to tighten the screws on each clamp until the nubs were aching, the air only enticing them more. “You follow directions perfectly.”

  He gave a tug on the connecting chain, shooting twin bolts of pain from her nipples in a direct line of fire to her pussy.

  “Safe words, Cali.”

  “Red, stop. Yellow, slow down. Green, go,” she panted.

  “And where are we now?”

  “Green.”

  “Excellent.”

  Jake had removed her skirt before he bound her ankles, so only her skimpy, boy-short panties, which hid nothing behind the black lace, remained. Despite her exposure, she was amazed to realize she was still okay with everything. The location didn’t change ho
w her mind and body reacted to being bound. She was excited and turned on beyond her imagination. She was in his hands.

  He would take care of her.

  And with that knowledge, she let go.

  “I’m using a flogger tonight. The marks will show red and bright against your pale skin. You’ll looked at them tomorrow and know I gave them to you.” He rubbed the ends of the object in discussion up her leg in a teasing taunt that immediately had her wanting more. The anticipation made her pussy wet, while her mind relaxed, settling into the quiet space of acceptance. “You’re going to beg me to let you come. But you won’t until I tell you. You won’t question me or resist me.” He leaned in and spoke directly into her ear. “Make me proud, Cali. Show everyone what a good sub you are.”

  The biting sting of the flogger flicked over the tender flesh of her thighs, making her cringe. He’d used a flogger on her before, so the sensation wasn’t new. But this one was sharper, the sting more intense than the flogger he’d used previously.

  He stepped back and she blanked her mind, letting the feeling absorb her. It was easier to do than she’d thought. Sinking into the pain, letting go, was something she’d come to need.

  “Why’d you come here?” The question yanked her from her zone, pulled her back to the moment. “Answer me.” The command was followed with a snap of the flogger tails over her breasts.

  She sucked in a breath, clenching tighter around her chains. He’d asked her a question. One she was supposed to answer.

  “To find a Dom,” she puffed out.

  “But why?” Again, the bite across her breast, the tails clipping her sore nipples. “Why did you want a Dom?”

  Why was he asking her this? “Because I wanted to be dominated?”

  “Wrong.” The angry retort was emphasized with an intense strike across her stomach. Her gut instinctively sucked in to get away from the attack, but it was already too late. “I want the real reason.”

  She tried to meet his eyes to see what he wanted from her, but he wouldn’t look at her. His focus was completely on her body, on the pink strips patterned over her flesh. What did he want? Another strike, the pain intensified and cloaked through her mind, making it even harder to think.

  “I don’t know,” she whimpered, her voice confused and weak. Her gaze flew around the room, as if she’d find the answer somewhere out there. But all she saw was a collection of intent faces all focused on her. On the Scene she was a part of. Oh, God. She felt the panic start to rise, the fear of being exposed clawing through her. What was she doing here?

  Then Jake was there, blocking her view, meeting her eyes. “Focus on me.” His intensity seared into her, restoring her calm. “You know the answer.” He gave her one brief kiss, his warm lips brushing against hers in a touch of confirmation before he stepped back and sent another lashing over her stomach. “Answer.”

  Answer. The stinging pain buzzed through her senses, her nerves on fire from the flaying of the flogger. Answer. Why did she come there? “To be touched.”

  That was true. It rang true in her garbled mind.

  “Good.” The hiss of the leather straps gave a brief warning before they connected with her midriff. “Why did you want to be touched?”

  She bit her lip—against the truth or the pain? She wasn’t sure. Why was he doing this? Jake knew the answer. She’d told him the first night.

  “Cali.” The command bolted through her name.

  She let her head fall forward, whether from shame or the simple inability to hold it up, she didn’t know. “Because he wouldn’t touch me,” she whispered.

  “Who’s he?”

  Who’s he? Fuck him. He knew who he was. Jake knew all of this.

  Swish, snap—another bite across one, then the other thigh. The endorphins were flooding her system now, merging with the pain to bring the wonderful floating sensation. She just wanted to float, not answer questions.

  Suddenly her chin was yanked up, her eyes flying open with the action. Jake stared back at her, his eyes dark and narrowed with anger. “You’re disobeying me.” His words were spoken through a clenched jaw, his brow furrowed in a mix of disappoint and disgust.

  Tears prickled in her eyes. The realization that she was the cause of those feelings stung worse than the bite of the flogger. “Sorry, sir,” she whispered.

  “Jake,” he snapped, his grip tightening on her chin.

  “Jake,” she pleaded. “Sorry. Please.”

  His fingers loosened slightly. “Who’s in control here?”

  “You.”

  “Who do you answer to?”

  “You.”

  “Then answer me, Cali.” Stepping back, he lifted the flogger and brought it down over her breasts, her arms and then stomach. “Now. Or end it.” His breath heaved, as heavy and deep as her own. His chest lifted in large draughts as he waited. For her.

  She blinked rapidly to hold back the threatening tears. She wouldn’t cry. Not here. Her lip quivered, her arms twitched, the tension strung tight from her grip on the chains. She could use her safe word. Stop the Scene. But she had to trust him. He was making her do this for a reason. One she didn’t understand, but there must be one. She had to believe that.

  “My ex-husband,” she finally croaked. God, the shame. She wanted to die. Right there. Her eyes were closed tight against the ridicule she knew she’d see in the watching faces. Her lips were clamped between her teeth to keep the agonizing moan from escaping. The one that sat aching in the back of her throat.

  “Good girl.”

  Smack, another bite of the flogger. And another. Jake continued with more strikes until her mind was floating back to the nowhere zone. Her muscles were beginning to relax once again, her hold on the chains going slack.

  “Whose fault was that, Cali?”

  What? She winced and snapped her head away from the question. As if she could deflect it by not facing it head-on. She struggled between the desire to ignore and hide from the question and the urgent need building inside of her to answer.

  To do as Jake asked.

  “Mine,” she finally admitted, the guilty word leaking out between barely moving lips. The admission caused her knees to weaken until her arms stretched tight against the restraining cuffs.

  “Wrong.”

  The growling denial bracketed against her and she tried to push away. From him, his anger. But there was nowhere for her to go. No escape. What did she do wrong? Confusion engulfed her, dramatized by the stinging pain lacing her body and the mellowing rush trying to temper it all.

  The sharp tug against her nipples made her gasp, followed by a low moan that welled up from deep in her chest. It sounded foreign, almost animalistic to her ears. Jake held the connecting chain of the nipple clamps in his fist, the slack pulled taut so the ends stretched the tender tips of her breasts. She arched her spine, trying to decrease the strain, until her head pushed back on the cross support.

  The nipples-to-pussy connection struck again, the pain firing down to ramp up her need. Unthinking, she tried to close her legs to hide the wetness that soaked her panties. Chains clanked and rattled with the jerk of her ankles.

  She couldn’t hide.

  In the next instant, her last protective barrier was yanked away in a violent tearing of material. She inhaled and straightened instantly, the action forcing the clamps to tighten and tug on her now-tortured nipples until black dots swam before her eyes.

  “There’s nothing left to hide behind. Now, think and give me the correct answer. Whose fault is it your ex-husband wouldn’t touch you?”

  The light, tickling stroke of the flogger brushed against her mound, so close to her wanting pussy. Close, but not touching, the gentle tease in direct contrast to the tight hold he still held on the nipple clamp chain. Her mind could barely function; all her focus was on her body, on the feelings Jake evoked in her.

  She had never felt so vulnerable and exposed in her entire life. She shuddered, a ripple of reaction that went through from head
to toe. A jerk on the clamps reminded her Jake wanted an answer.

  If her first answer was wrong, what else was there?

  “No one’s?”

  “Wrong.” The sharp reprimand was followed by the slap of the flogger over her now-exposed mound.

  She whimpered and shook.

  There was only one answer left to give. “His.”

  “Correct, Cali.” Instantly her nipple clamps were removed.

  Blood flooded into the nubs to make them pound in rhythms of pain matching the beat of her heart. She screamed, unable to keep the releasing sound from escaping. She wasn’t sure if the scream was for the external pain flowing from her breasts or the internal pain wrenching her heart. Then his mouth was there, lapping and soothing away the ache as he diligently attended to the sore peaks. The contrasting sensation was overwhelming, his attention reassuring.

  His approval, topped with the hot moisture of his mouth against the diminishing pain, had her so close to the edge. She could feel the evidence of her arousal making its way down her inner thigh. If she had any humility left, she’d be mortified.

  “Do you believe that?” Jake stared into her eyes, the force of his intentions staggering. “Do you believe his actions were his own and not something you caused?”

  Did she? She couldn’t think anymore.

  “You are gorgeous, Cali. Beautiful. Giving.” He was so close she could almost sink into him. Almost. “Anyone who could not see that, not appreciate that, is a fool. If you don’t believe me, then believe them.”

  Jake stepped aside but held her jaw so she had no choice except to look at the crowd of people who now gathered around them three to four deep.

  She recoiled, closing her eyes to hide, but Jake wouldn’t let her.

  “Look. Look at their faces, in their eyes, and tell me what you see.”

  Did she dare? Did she have the courage to face the ridicule, the scorn she would see there? She could call a stop, use her safe word and flee. Or she could obey Jake and see what he wanted her to see.

  “Trust me,” Jake said into her ear. “I would never, ever hurt you.”

  Doubt swamped her in hard, thundering echoes of fear built on years of neglect. She bit her lip, the tight hold on the tender flesh doing little to stop the trembling she was unable to control. Jake’s grip tightened on her chin, in reminder or anger she didn’t know. It didn’t matter.