SubmissivesSurrender Page 7

  He waited until she took a steadying breath before giving in to a need no civilized man should admit to but probably some did by taking hold of her hair and forcing her to look up at him. She looked so damn submissive, so into him. Galvanized by the thought, he drew up on the chain. Her breast lifted.

  “Feel my presence, slave. Know your captor has returned.”

  Tears glistened. She made no attempt to break free. “Welcome home, Master.”

  Yes, Master. “Have you been good in my absence? You kept your hands off yourself because you know your body belongs to me.”

  “I tried.” She took a shuddering breath. “But you were gone for so long and I became so hungry whenever I thought about you.”

  “You didn’t pray I’d be killed?”

  “No! Never. Master, I’m ready, full of need.”

  Maybe she was so deep into the sensations the clamp was causing that she didn’t realize what she was saying. As for him, there was no denying his words and actions were driven by her helpless, naked body.

  “You’re hungry for me because I trained you well. You aren’t just a slave to my greater power?”

  “No.” She tried to shake her head but his hold on her hair stopped her. “I’m a captive to—you know.”

  These crazy moments weren’t going to last. Any second now sanity would return but in the meantime he’d become the dominant force she needed.

  “You’re a slut,” he told her as he released her hair. “A whore who grovels at her master’s feet. You’ve forgotten who you used to be. Only his presence matters.”

  “I live for you.”

  Him, not the savage their imaginations had created. “We’re good for each other. Even though we might never admit it, we complement each other.” He wasn’t sure whether he was talking about savage and hostage or Karmen and him. Maybe a little of both.

  “I do this—” He seized her free breast as he’d done with the first. This time he didn’t give her time to prepare before trapping her nipple within the silver clamp. “because it seals our relationship.”

  “Ah—ah yes.”

  Fighting the compulsion to push her back on the bed so he could study her captured breasts and exposed sex, he forced his hands into his pockets. They were so close together her features weren’t clear but there was no mistaking her battle to remain on top of this new discomfort. Several times she straightened as if trying to distance herself from her throbbing nipples followed by shuddering and slumping forward. Maybe she was trying to cradle her breasts, protect them.

  After watching her for several moments, he drew his right hand out of his pocket and stroked her cheek.

  “Your master is proud of you.”

  “Because?”

  “Because you proved your courage and surrendered. You’re worthy of being called my slave.”

  She leaned into his touch. “Thank you. Master, would you— I would consider it a great honor if you paraded me like this in front of the tribe. I won’t cry or beg to have the clamps removed. Instead—” She swallowed. “I’ll remain like this until it pleases you to offer me relief.”

  Seeing her tears, he decided they’d gone far enough—for today. She might have entered a place of altered reality and needed his help returning to the real world.

  “It pleases me to end your pain now.” Still stroking her cheek, he freed one nipple and then the other.

  When her trembling increased, he massaged her nipples to help restore circulation there. She soon settled down and her eyes no longer glistened. Even as he took pride in doing what she couldn’t for herself, he wished they could have kept going. They’d just touched the line between the world they’d always lived in and something new.

  Exciting.

  “What happened?” She licked her lips. “Did I pass out?”

  “What do they call it, sub space? Something like that.”

  “Whew.” She blew out her breath. “Amazing.”

  Driven by his humming need, he slid an exploratory hand over her crotch. Her hot juices drenched him. Now it was his turn to shake.

  “Did you climax?” he managed.

  Chapter Eight

  How could she not know whether she’d climaxed? Karmen remained acutely aware of her still-throbbing breasts to say nothing of the masculine hand settled over her crotch. Bits and pieces of the roleplaying they’d been engaged in echoed in her brain. Maybe that’s why she was so confused.

  “I’m a mess,” she admitted. “A delicious mess.”

  “That’s an interesting way of putting it. What about your arms?”

  “They’ve felt better.”

  “I bet they have. Time to do something about it.”

  She waited for him to reach behind her, waited with her heart on overdrive and her thighs pressing against his. She couldn’t imagine ever wanting to wear clothes again but nudity wasn’t enough. Even with everything that had taken place between them, they hadn’t done what she needed most. To hell with trying to wrap her mind around the appeal of BDSM! She needed to get laid.

  Without warning, he backed away from her, taking his all-encompassing hand with him. Furious and frustrated, she started to stand but before she could complete the move, he seized her shoulders and flipped her around so her back was to him. He pushed her facedown onto the bed and hoisted her onto it, leaving her legs dangling.

  His silence didn’t alarm her. She buried herself in his iron will and waited. A moment later, he pulled her legs apart and stepped into the opening. He was doing something to her wrists.

  “There.”

  The single word brought her back to herself. He’d unhooked the handcuffs leaving the leather around her wrists. Circulation returned to burn from her shoulders to her hands as he lifted her arms over her head and refastened the restraints so her arms would be in front when and if he let her stand.

  “I’m not ready to grant you full freedom.” He planted his fingertips at the base of her neck. “You haven’t earned it.”

  “Maybe I don’t want freedom. Maybe I want…”

  “What is it you need?” He punctuated his question by running a thumb between her ass cheeks.

  Oh shit! You claiming me. “You’re asking a lot of me.”

  “You aren’t the only one stepping into new territory. How about we start with something that might be easier for you to talk about. Once you’ve done that,” his nail touched her puckered opening, “we’ll move on to other things.”

  He expected her to think when it took everything she possessed not to howl.

  “All right,” he went on. “I’ll take your silence as agreement. We’ll stay like we are, not pushing any more buttons than are already being pushed.” He made a lie of his comment by running his hand from the back of her neck down her spine. Electrified, she tried to roll onto her side.

  “No, no, my little hostage and sex slave-in-training. You’re staying right where I want you and you’re going to answer my question.” His fingers lightly massaged between her shoulder blades.

  “What if I can’t?”

  “It isn’t that kind of question. National secrets aren’t at risk.”

  Despite her ramped-up arousal, she laughed. “That’s good because I have top-level clearance with the CIA.”

  “Then I should have asked for more ransom.”

  She wanted him to continue talking, needed something other than her body to focus on. Undoubtedly he knew, which was why he let the seconds tick past. The ways he touched her were crazy-making.

  “I keep waiting for you to settle down,” he finally said. “But you’re still tense under my fingers.” He rubbed her asshole.

  Her muscles there contracted. “Stop!”

  “I would—” His nails brushed over her right shoulder blade followed by her left. “If I really believed that’s what you want. It’s really quite simple, at least I hope it will be. I want you to tell me what you were referring to when you said you never again want to be terrified. What happened? You were in an accide
nt? Robbed maybe? Raped?”

  “No,” she got out despite a body that still felt like fireworks going off. “I was in a fender-bender but nothing— It was a long time ago.”

  His fingers stopped moving, but as long as he touched her, her nerves would remain on alert.

  “What was it?” He spoke softly. “I’d like to know.”

  Like to know. She closed her eyes to help her concentrate.

  “I was a high school freshman. It was a fairly small school, and the seniors were in charge. There was a gang of girls that got a kick out of intimidating younger students.”

  “Girls can be cruel. The way they use words—”

  “It wasn’t just words.” Talking about what she saw as the defining experience of her life still tied her in knots but as she told Rico what had happened, it felt as if she were talking about someone else.

  Despite her small size, she’d been athletic and strong. Her parents had enrolled her in gymnastics classes when she was five so by the time she reached high school, she was an accomplished gymnast. When the cheerleading coach saw her perform, she invited her to try out for cheerleading. She’d made the varsity squad to the delight of the two boys on the team who preferred lifting her instead of heavier girls.

  “Suddenly I was popular, a popular lowly freshman. That didn’t sit well with some of the senior girls and not just cheerleaders. I started getting warnings to drop out or there’d be consequences.”

  “Did you tell an adult about it?”

  She shook her head as best she could. “My folks had raised me to fight my own battles so although I was nervous I hoped if I kept quiet and didn’t back down, eventually it would blow over. I was wrong.”

  Suddenly the mattress sagged, rolling her toward Rico who had just sat down. Between that and accepting that he was no longer touching her, the intensity of the memory faded a little. She wasn’t sure how she felt, still sexually on-edge of course but it went deeper.

  “What did they do?”

  Struck by his concern, she struggled to a sitting position with her legs bent and tethered hands grasping her toes. His expression was sober.

  “They caught me alone. Beat me up.” She angled her left arm toward him so he could see the thin scar running from her elbow halfway up her shoulder. “Knife.”

  “My god. They were trying to kill you.”

  “No, I don’t think so. They just wanted to scare the crap out of me, which they did. The knife was supposed to intimidate but I made the mistake of trying to get my hands on it. I-I’m not sure what I was thinking, just trying to stay alive. When they saw the blood they took off.”

  He ran his fingers over the scar. “What were your other injuries?”

  “Black eyes. A broken nose that fortunately didn’t mess up my sinuses. Two cracked ribs and a lot of bruises.” Her attempt at a laugh failed. “Obviously I did a lousy job of holding my own.”

  Still stroking the scar, he shook his head. “How many were there?”

  “Five.”

  “Five against one. I’d say you did damn well. How did your parents react?”

  With outrage, she explained. They were still in the emergency room with her when they called the principal and school board members. The press came next. She’d been embarrassed to be the object of so much attention and the students had been split between siding with her and those responsible. Her parents and the cheerleading coach had helped her understand that the students who said she’d gotten what she deserved didn’t want to risk antagonizing the gang.

  There were suspensions and talk of formal charges plus a couple of school assemblies devoted to lectures against bullying. Because she hadn’t wanted anyone to see her looking like a punching bag, she’d stayed home for a couple of weeks after the attack. The nightmares started that first night and lasted for several years. She dropped out of cheerleading and her grades suffered until the middle of her sophomore year when her family performed their version of an intervention.

  “Mostly they reminded me that I’d once been strong and it was time to become that girl again. The lesson stuck.”

  “If it hadn’t you wouldn’t have let me do this.” He indicated the cuffs.

  “Maybe. And maybe…” Spilling her guts had taken a lot out of her, but if she closed up now she wouldn’t be able to face herself in the mirror. Her naked self.

  “Pretty much that’s why I got into self-defense to the extent I did. That’s also what led to my coming here. I told myself I wanted to experience BDSM so hopefully I could understand why a liberated woman would take a subservient role, but it’s gone deeper than that. More personal.”

  His expression had remained grim the whole time she was talking. She liked seeing his features soften now, liked a lot about him. The man knew how to take charge all right but more important, he reached beyond himself. Reached her.

  “You’re discovering you have a bit of a sub in you.” He reinforced his point by hooking his forefinger through the chain linking the cuffs and lifting her arms over her head. “Giving up control isn’t as impossible as you thought it would be. In fact it has turned out to be a turn-on.”

  Her nipples tightened, and she impulsively tightened her pussy muscles. Yes, pussy! An earthy term that fit with what she was feeling.

  “What about you?” she asked over the roaring in her head. “What’s responsible for your hard-on?”

  He stared at her breasts. “You have to ask? I can’t remember the last time I sat on a bed across from a naked woman.”

  Despite the searing sensation where his gaze rested, she gave him a disapproving look. “She isn’t going to like hearing that.”

  “Who isn’t?”

  “Your last naked woman.”

  “Forget her. You’re the only one who counts.”

  He might not have meant much by the comment, but she didn’t think so. Holding her arms over her head caused him to lean toward her, to take over her space and imprint her with his heat.

  He extended his free hand and rested it on her inner thigh not far from her sex.

  “How did you think things would play out between us?” he asked. “Did you consider that we might have sex?”

  No wonder he was such a successful businessman. His direct approach had undoubtedly made an impression on his clients and employees. But she wasn’t someone he encountered at work, she was what?

  “I wasn’t sure whether we’d connect.” Much as she wanted to meet his gaze, the hand on her thigh distracted her. “I kept things open-ended in my mind. I figured if we were on the same wavelength it might happen but if we weren’t…”

  “Are we?”

  “What do you think?”

  He nodded.

  “No doubt?” Why did she keep asking stupid questions?

  He didn’t immediately answer, instead gazing at her until she felt compelled to lift her head and return his stare. Most people wouldn’t call him handsome but his intensity spoke to her on every level and that made physical appearance unimportant.

  “No.” He frowned. “I have no doubt. I didn’t expect to feel like this. Emotional connection is rare for me.”

  Why? “Me too,” she admitted. “I’m close to my family and several girlfriends but romantic relationships have been another story. I don’t know why.”

  “Maybe it’s time to find out.”

  He could have intended his comment as a challenge but she didn’t care. “What did you have in mind?”

  Chapter Nine

  Rico looked incredible naked. His commitment to physical fitness had paid off in the form of a flat belly and sharply defined muscles. He was obviously comfortable with his body as witnessed by the easy way his arms rested at his sides. He felt no need to shield his cock. His face and arms were a little darker than the rest of him. He wasn’t as pale as she was. Later, she told herself, she’d conduct a thorough inventory of the man but right now she couldn’t take her attention off his rigid cock long enough to give the rest of him its due.


  Thick black hairs framed his erection and provided a tantalizing contrast to his engorged veins and the potent tip. He was, as the saying went, well hung.

  Very well hung.

  “I could have done that.” She indicated the clothes he’d tossed onto the nearby chair. “In fact I’d love—”

  “Maybe next time, if I decide that’s what I want.”

  Next time. Between the possibility and his take-charge statement, she could only nod. She was sitting cross-legged on the bed with her cuffed hands on her sex. The only way she’d been able to keep from jumping his bones as he stripped was by masturbating. Every time she tried to stop, the top of her head threatened to blow off.

  “Of course, Master. I’ll always do what you want.”

  “Master? I don’t think I want to hear that anymore today. It’s time for the real thing.”

  She couldn’t agree more. In fact if her legs hadn’t started to go numb, she would have already wrapped herself around him. The bands on her wrists added to her excitement.

  Giving her a mouthwatering view of his dusky ass, he walked over to the table where he’d gotten the nipple clamps and returned with a foil-wrapped condom. His attention fixed on her, he tore the foil and pulled out a condom.

  “Obviously Unchained is prepared for all possibilities,” he said as he put it on.

  Seeing the rubber stretched over his cock made it hard to breathe. Foreplay, if that’s what they’d been doing, was probably over. She gasped and pressed her fingers against her labia. That earned her a shake of his head.

  “I might not be your master but right now I am the dominant one. I don’t want you touching what belongs to me, understand?”

  Feeling as if a hot mist were closing around her, she sighed and reluctantly rested her hands over her belly.

  “That’s better. Now I want you to demonstrate your understanding of what today is about.” He folded his arms across his chest. “Do it with action, not words.”

  She tingled all over, a nerve-sparking sensation that sent moisture leaking from her. She’d never been this on edge, never! Her first impulse was to climb off the bed and sink to her knees before him but much as she longed to house his cock in her mouth, she needed to taste him, not some manmade product.