*
Troy left with Shale in her car, and Logan drove Madison back to hers at the store. Logan walked her to it, took her keys and opened it, looking inside before handing them back. It was the act of a courteous Southern gentleman, but there was that additional component to it as well, him taking charge in a way that kept her nerves humming pleasurably from the close proximity.
The rules could be bent, right? Yes, but with consequences. She thought about those twenty-five switches. She had no doubt Logan would carry through with them. Then she thought of that look Troy had given his Mistress when her nails dug into his biceps. That was part of it for them, wasn't it? The line between misbehavior that was improper, unwelcome, and stepping across the line to give his Mistress the opportunity to administer punishment. Two needs being met. It was a delicate dance, but one that didn't require much thought at all on her part. Just being who she was.
Logan bent to brush her lips with his, an obviously restrained gesture with so much more vibrating beneath it. "See you Monday," he said.
She played along, wanting to goad him a little. "So what are you doing with your weekend?"
"Making some renovations at the house. I'm preparing for a new tenant and I want to make sure everything is in place to keep her there for a good long time."
He gave her a wink while her stomach fluttered. When he started to step back, she curled her fingers into the spaces between the buttons of his shirt, holding on. He paused, eyes finding hers.
"Please kiss me, Master," she whispered. "Really kiss me. I'd rather take a punishment later than not have that now."
He put his hands on her shoulders, and she sighed into his mouth as his lips sealed over hers. Slow, but not restrained. It was a thorough, overwhelming kiss that had her sliding her arms under his so she could get even closer. He let go of her shoulders to frame her jaw and throat with both hands, hold her there as her lips parted and his tongue mated with hers. Then he had her against her car, his body trapping her there, so she dug her fingers into his back and made a needy sound in her throat.
She'd loved dancing with him, loved talking with him. She teased him about being the all-knowing guru of BDSM, but she clung to every word as he taught her about it, secure in his knowledge about a world that was both so new and yet instinctively familiar to her. He didn't talk to her the way he talked to Troy. It was like he was her personal guide, her partner, not just a temporary teacher. It was different, the same way it was different for Troy and Shale.
She stopped thinking. She let go of everything but being kissed by Logan Scott, thinking of him as hers. Her Master and no one else's.
When he lifted his head at last, they stared at each other. Nothing needed to be said, but so many possibilities whirled in the air between them. He gestured toward her car door. "Get in so I can make sure you're safe and on your way before I go back into my shop."
"Will you work late tonight?"
"I have a piece I'm finishing."
"I'd like to stay and watch. May I?"
"I'm not much of a conversationalist when I'm working. It's important to focus, to be sure I'm creating what the person is wanting."
"I just want to watch." She tilted her head, giving him a look intended to be humorous, but instead she stayed serious. "I'll only speak if spoken to."
She loved those sparks that ignited in his brown eyes. He had triggers for his Master cravings, the same as she had for her submissive ones. Maybe she wasn't a full octane sub like Troy, but maybe worrying that she wouldn't be as much of a sub as Logan wanted was inhibiting her getting in touch with just how much of a submissive she really was. She could already imagine the ways he might let her "watch" if she fully embraced her desires in that regard.
"Your pulse just increased and I can feel your nipples becoming harder. If I reached under your skirt, you'd be wet, wouldn't you?"
"I've been that way since I first saw you today," she said. Right after she'd received the box.
The look in his eyes speared longing right to her core. "But something made you even wetter just now. Tell me what it was."
She amazed herself by doing just that. "I imagined you letting me watch you work, but you put a collar on me. Attached it with a long chain to the leg of the couch in your workshop area. Like I'm a . . . pet waiting for your attention. And I'm naked."
When he finished creating, he'd come to her, sawdust still on his hands, that fresh, sweet smell. He'd part her bare thighs and sheathe himself. She'd be so wet, no foreplay would be needed. He'd slide right into her body, available to her Master whenever he wanted it.
She said all that in a whisper, her gaze dropping to his throat. He tilted her face up, fingers pressing hard into her tender flesh, his eyes on fire. "I like that idea," he growled. His grip eased, somewhat, as he caressed her face. "But tonight, clothes stay on. You'd be too distracting for your Master otherwise."
When she closed her eyes, he tapped her cheek. "What?"
"I . . . like it when you call yourself that." Her Master.
"Good. Because that's what I am, Madison. You're starting to realize that, aren't you?"
Hoping. Terrified, thrilled. But hoping.
She felt as still as a bird in a box when they went into his workshop area. He nodded toward the small restroom facility, suggesting she use it before he got started. While she was in there, she heard a noise that drew things tighter in her lower belly. The clank of chains.
When she came out, he'd added a couple pillows to the couch and some magazines, making her space more comfortable. Perhaps it was self-interest to give her a distraction, since having a chained girl staring at him while he was working might be a little distracting. She was a mass of butterflies. She was going to let him collar her, make her lie quietly at his command and watch him work. Wait on his pleasure, his attention. The fact she'd asked to be in such a position and he'd agreed was a significant step forward in their journey together. She knew he was as aware of that as she was, else he wouldn't have reacted with that piercing regard, the possessive growl in his voice that had made her even wetter.
He turned from the piece she assumed was his project for the evening and came to her, his gaze passing over her in that assessing way he had. Taking her arm in a firm grasp, he guided her to the couch. She'd borrowed from her stock and changed for the club into a pair of dance heels, a short skirt and a sexy silky blouse through which she'd felt the heat of his hands quite a few times tonight. His eyes had often dipped into the low-cut, gathered neckline to catch a glimpse of the barely there lace bra beneath. She'd put up her hair for the dancing, which exposed her neck.
Now, as she kept her gaze on him, he picked up a collar he'd left on the couch arm. It was a serviceable collar, like one she'd seen him put on Troy, though this had a more slender strap, one he buckled around her neck snugly, but it wasn't too tight. He let her see the next piece as well, a heart-shaped lock about a square inch in size. When he hooked it into the buckling piece of the collar, she realized it meant the collar couldn't be removed without opening the lock. Suddenly that small weight seemed much more substantial.
He bent again, picked up the chain she'd heard clanking. He'd attached it to the leg of the sofa, just as she'd described. Threading the padlock into the end link of the chain, he attached it to the collar and snapped the lock closed. Now neither chain nor collar could be removed without him providing the key.
He wasn't done, however. As he sat her down on the couch, her pulse had speeded up even more. He guided her legs so she was reclined on a hip, then he moved down to the opposite end. Taking another chain and attaching the end of it to the opposite sofa leg, he looped the slack around her ankle and beneath the sole of the shoe before using another small padlock to secure the chain at her ankle. It held her foot securely to the other end of the couch with just enough length she could keep her foot up on the cushions.
If he'd left her attached only at one point, the collar, she could have slipped off the couch, moved ar
ound. Even lifted the end of the sofa if it wasn't too heavy and slipped the chain attached to her collar out from under its anchor. Now, stretched between the two points, that was impossible. Not uncomfortably so. She could partially sit up, even stretch out on her back, but she wasn't getting away from the couch without his help, and the psychology of that elicited a potent reaction.
His fingers slid up her inner thigh. Without any command from him, she parted her legs. Reaching beneath the short skirt, Logan stroked her through the thin barrier of the panties.
"Christ, you're as soaked as if you climaxed." He gave her a mock-stern look, pinched her clit, making her jump, gasp. "Did you masturbate while you were in the bathroom?"
"No, Master." She shook her head. "You know I didn't. It's just . . . you make me this way."
Those licks of fire in his eyes were going to make her burst into flame. He bent, put his lips on her thigh, his nostrils flaring as he obviously inhaled her scent. Then he straightened. "If I didn't have to concentrate, I'd put a vibrator on you and watch you come again and again," he said. "But I think this will be enough to inspire me. My client's going to get my best work tonight, thanks to you."
How could any rational woman explain why it turned her into a pool of lust to be collared and chained by such a man? Such feelings only increased as he moved to do his work, leaving her there as his possession, to be enjoyed and used by him at his leisure, not her own. Knowing he did it because it made her so intensely aroused, her helpless pleasure driving his? It was indescribable.
Yes, she could see herself during a night out with the women she'd worked with at her former job in Boston. "Oh, Doris, I'm so glad to hear you aced your recent board meeting and sent that bunch of sexist assholes home with their tails between their legs. Last weekend, I was chained to a sofa like a sex slave by a man I've started to call Master." And I've never felt so cherished . . . or felt so loved . . . in all my life.
She stared at him, her pulse pounding high and hard now for a different reason. It was the truth, and she found no fault with it, no instant scream for therapy from her rational mind. He picked up his tools. "Read your magazines," he ordered. "Let me know if you get uncomfortable or if you need anything. Anything important," he amended, that familiar gleam coming to his eye. "Else I'll have to gag you."
*
He worked for a solid two hours. With no access to a clock, she thought it could have been two minutes or two eternities. Time was both irrelevant and excruciating. She did page through one of the magazines, but in the end, she just watched him. She folded her hands beneath her head, fingers idly playing in the links of the chain attached to the collar. Her legs were bent enough she could feel the pull of the other chain on her ankle.
He chiseled out curves in the wood as sweet as a woman's. He bored holes, biceps flexing as he put pressure on the tool, and attached pieces with carefully placed fasteners.
As his work took shape, she saw it was fashioned after the stocks placed in a public square to punish and humiliate someone. It had the usual three holes for head and wrists, but he had it designed so the height could be adjusted, the servant bent at angles according to the desires of the Dominant. He had an additional panel that could be slotted and locked into the top of the stocks. Studying it, she realized the spaced holes were intended for a woman's breasts. Just like the bench piece he'd shown her the first time she'd toured his workshop, it gave the Master the ability to run a chain between nipple clamps or piercings, so the captive couldn't pull back, free herself.
The way he carefully checked the dimensions suggested the woman in question had been measured, probably by her Master. She imagined Logan doing that to her, so he could design furniture to hold her according to his desires. She wondered what he might make, what he'd like to do to her.
Though he was absorbed in his work, he did glance her way now and then. He didn't speak, but she thought he might be checking on how she was doing, or perhaps gaining more inspiration, because his gaze would course over the chains holding her, linger on her collar. Once, when he did that, she found herself lifting her chin to display it more prominently. The flicker in his eyes made her fingers curl into the sofa cushions. When he returned his attention to his work, she was nearly breathless.
She wondered if all craftsmen were as beautiful as the objects they created. He'd shed his shirt, revealing the white undershirt he wore beneath it, and had pulled that free from his jeans. When he squatted to peer up at something from a different angle, denim stretched deliciously over his thighs, his taut ass, his shoulders flexing as he tented his fingers on the ground, holding his balance. Later, when he finished coaxing out the shape of the wood, he began to use the hand sander, smoothing the wood while tiny shavings frosted his forearms. His arm muscles rolled like ocean surf as he performed every step needed to perfect his work.
She wanted him to come to her, push her back on the sofa, still chained, and take her like she'd imagined. Leave her wet with his seed, and then go back to what he was doing, making her feel used and needed. Though he appeared to be fully engrossed in what he was doing, she'd never felt so noticed, at an intense level she'd never imagined it possible for a man to notice a woman. He was as aware of her as he was his own breath or heart beating. Most people thought they didn't think about those things, but in fact they were more aware of them than anything else, an integral part of their existence, a constant reminder they were alive.
At length, he was done for the night. He wiped down his tools, put them away. Sweeping up the sawdust, he dumped it in a bin, hung the dustpan and broom back on the wall, then moved to the utility sink to wash his hands and forearms. She watched him dry his hands, run a wet cloth over his face and neck before he turned to her.
Her lips were parted, her throat dry. She hadn't thought to drink any of the bottled water he'd left within reach, her focus all on him. He leaned against the sink and picked up his own bottle, taking a deep swig from it. As he wiped his mouth with a casual forearm, his eyes stayed on her.
"Are you still wet for me, Madison?"
When she nodded, his gaze sharpened like the tools he was using. He didn't have to say anything; he was a teacher adept at giving his students precise nonverbal cues.
"Yes sir." Yes, Master. She wanted to call him that, write it on a chalkboard over and over like a punishment and reward both.
"Show me you're ready to be fucked. Put your fingers inside yourself, move them around so I can hear your cunt suck on them."
It was amazing how vulgarity became poetry in the right circumstances. She shifted, hearing the sound of her chains as she put her hands beneath the skirt.
"Pull it up. I want to see."
She wriggled so the short skirt was up at her hips and he could see the swatch of panties she wore. He raised a finger, stilling her.
He took another sip of the water, studying what she was revealing, probably the crotch panel of her panties, so soaked the silk would be transparent. "Spread your legs wider."
She trembled at his tone. She'd refuse him nothing. The note had said "From here forward, you are not allowed to pleasure yourself in any way. Or be pleasured. A single infraction will incur severe punishment. Twenty-five strikes with a switch."
But he was her Master, here in the flesh, and she wouldn't resist him. Wouldn't deny him. Would he still, in whatever role he played for her this weekend, punish her for not following the instructions? Of course he would. That was part of the game, right? It made her tremble harder, knowing the punishment would be harsh, and yet whatever happened here would be worth it.
"Proceed."
She pulled aside the crotch panel and dipped two fingers inside herself. Her lips parted further, her throat working on a noisy swallow at the brief contact between her fingers and the sensitive internal and external tissues. Under his gaze, her pussy contracted, and she did hear it, that greedy suck on her fingers as her sex begged for that for which her fingers could only be a poor substitute. She pushed deeper ins
ide herself, pulled out enough to repeat the noise, and a moan slipped from her lips. A plea.
He watched her, his lips firm and unyielding, eyes fastened on what she was doing. He'd stopped drinking from the bottle, however, and when he shifted his thighs so his feet were planted at a wider angle, she wished the hem of the shirt wasn't hiding his reaction beneath the jeans. She wanted to see his erection growing, wanted to know just how much effort it was taking to deny himself. She also wanted to drop her head back, close her eyes, immerse herself in the feeling, but watching him was such an essential part of that, she didn't want to lose the visual input.
"Stop. Remove your fingers from yourself and hold them out toward me."
She did it, seeing her knuckles glistening with her juices. When he moved toward her at last, the quivering of her body increased. He moved with such purpose, such focus, it was as if he pulled in everything around him, including her, increasing the density of the very air.
Grasping her wrist, he tugged her upright until the chain pulled at her collar, indicating she'd come up as far as her bonds allowed. He dipped his head, smelled her fingers, his nostrils flaring. Then his tongue came out and he licked, a light tracing of her knuckle, sampling. When at last he sucked one finger in fully, the chains jangled as she jerked in sensual reaction.
He raised his head. "Lie back and spread your legs again. Both arms above your head, fingers holding on to the arm of the couch. Stay that way."
She obeyed, and she couldn't stop shaking, needing. He took off his shirt, revealing fine, furred muscle. He opened his jeans, a quick slip of the button, a tugging of the zipper, the denim pushed down just enough to suit his intent. From the sinuous roll of his hips, the way he reached in to stretch out what was beneath, she anticipated and was not disappointed to see he was fully erect, thick and hard, the tip already damp with viscous fluid.