“It’s your home, too. Why would I mind?”
“I didn’t know. I just wanted to ask.”
“This is your home, too, not just mine.”
“I don’t mind Walt being here, either,” he said, glancing up at him. “I’m cool with it. And I’m not trying to say I want you to move out. But don’t not move in with him just because you don’t want me to be alone, either. I’m stronger than you think I am, and I know how you are, sis.”
She winced as she sat up to hug him. “I just got you home a couple of weeks ago. I’m not anywhere close to being sick of you yet,” she said. “I might spend some nights over at his house. Honestly?” She didn’t bother trying to fight the tears. “I still want to walk down to your room at night and look to make sure you’re there. I keep worrying that it’s a dream and I’ll wake up and you’re not here.”
“True story,” Walt said. “Several times I’ve had to get up and make her come back to bed.”
“Well, just about every night since I got back I’ve had to pinch myself to remind me I’m really home, so I guess we’re even.” Louis smiled as she sat back. “We’re a pair, huh, sis?”
“Yeah, we’re a pair, all right.”
Chapter Twenty-Eight
A month after Louis regained his freedom, and it was a Saturday night. Walt and Holly were going to go to dinner at Sigalo’s, followed by an evening at Venture, then back to his house.
At least, that was the plan as Holly thought she knew it.
But that morning, while Holly watched Louis working outside in the backyard on a flowerbed with Sasha playing with a chew toy in the shade, Walt slipped his arms around Holly’s waist from behind.
“I have a little surprise for you tonight, but I need to talk to you about it first.”
“Why?”
“Because you kind of need to know.”
She turned in his arms, draping hers around his neck. “What?”
She loved his blue eyes and could stare into them forever, it felt like. Just as she was right now.
“We’ve sort of discussed a collaring, but really didn’t decide anything.”
“Yeah?”
“Do you still want to do that?”
She felt her breath catch in her throat and finally nodded. “Yes, Sir,” she said. “I want that.”
“This is something we can do now,” he said. “The wedding can come whenever, but I love you, and even though you’re wearing my ring, I can’t deny that the sadist in me would love to see you wearing my collar. Well, it’s not a collar, but it’s a collar.”
She couldn’t suppress her laugh. “A collar that’s not a collar?”
“I know you have trouble with things around your neck,” he said. “So I had this made.” He pulled a satin bag from the pocket of his shorts and withdrew a beautiful, delicate stainless steel chainmaille bracelet from it. “I had it custom-made for you by Rebecca.”
“It’s beautiful!”
“Even better than a collar, because you can wear it all the time and not have to worry about what people think. But I have…conditions.”
She nodded and reached out to stroke the bracelet’s weave with her finger.
“We pretty much do this already, but if we hold a collaring, they’ll be formal and required now. All the stuff we’ve already discussed and agreed to applies. You will listen to me when it comes to taking care of yourself. You’re going to be completely honest with me about how you’re feeling, and your pain levels, and if anything I’m doing hurts you in the bad way. And you’re going to quit working where you are now and stay home. You can work helping Louis with managing his schedule, or doing something less stressful, but that job you’re at is going to kill you with stress.”
“How will I pay my bills?”
“I’m going to pay them. I already talked to Louis about this part, too. He’s going to take over paying the household bills around here with the money he’s got coming in. He agrees he wants you to take it easy.”
“So I’m outnumbered, is what you’re saying?”
“Yep.” He arched an eyebrow at her. “Fair warning, we won’t get married unless this is hammered out already. I love you, and I’m not going to let you drive yourself into the ground. Not when I can take care of you. Can you trust me enough to fully let go to me?”
It scared her, but in a way…it also felt freeing.
If she couldn’t trust Walt after all he’d done for her and Louis, when would trust kick in?
“Yes, Sir,” she said.
He stroked her cheek. “Good girl. Then we can have the collaring tonight at the club.”
“But…wait. What about the rest of your conditions?”
“Those were them.”
“That’s it?”
He grinned. “Want me to toss in ‘panties are a privilege not a right’ as a condition?”
“No, I’m serious. That’s all?”
He tucked the bracelet back into the bag and returned it to his pocket. Then he gently gathered her hands in his and held them against his chest the way she loved.
“That’s it, sweetheart. I’ll never cheat on you, and that’s a given I expect in return. If I want to play with Tory, or anyone else, I will ask you first. If you say no, I won’t play with them. You are my priority, and everything I do will be to the end of taking care of you. Every rule I have, other than the no cheating and no lying, all boil down to one thing—taking care of you. I don’t see what’s so complicated about this.”
“But…” She struggled to comprehend the simplicity of it. “Shouldn’t there be more rules than that?”
“Who makes the rules?”
“You do, Sir.”
“Do you have a problem with the rules as I’ve laid them out? And yes, you can always safeword.”
“No, Sir, I don’t have a problem with them. It’s just…not exactly what I expected.”
“I only make as many rules as I want,” he said. “And I want to keep it simple.” He kissed her. “I don’t need a lot of rules. If you want me to state it all Domly and shit, then how about this: Your rule above all else is that in everything you do, you always take care of my property first, meaning you. Period.”
“I just…it seems too easy.”
“I want it to be easy. I could come up with a thousand complicated rituals and protocols that I’ll damn sure never remember. Even if I did, one fibro flare will toss them out the window because you’re in pain. I’m a sadist, not an asshole. My number one priority as your Owner or Dominant or Master or whatever title you want me to have is that I take care of you. That’s my rule. So any and all rules I give you will always circle around to that one key point. Understand?”
“Yes, Sir. I love you.”
“I love you, too, sweetheart.” He gently drew her into his arms. “That’s why I want to spend the rest of my life with you.”
* * * *
After dinner, when they went to the club, Holly knew Walt must have told their friends what he had planned, because as everyone arrived, they gathered in the social area, where he was sitting with Holly in his lap.
Lynn, Paul, Terrie, and Mark had all come out tonight, too.
Loren called for everyone’s attention. “Walt asked for a few minutes to take care of a little business. In case everyone didn’t know, he put a ring on it, even if they haven’t set a date yet. But now he wants to make things official in our way.”
Walt helped Holly stand, then he stood and slid the chair away from the table and had her sit in it.
With his hand resting on her shoulder, he addressed everyone. “Some of you know how we met and some of the other circumstances we’ve been dealing with for the past several months. We can’t begin to tell you how much your love and support has meant to us. Finally, a painful chapter has been closed, and now we’re able to focus on our future together, and focus on helping her brother heal from what he went through.”
She reached up and curled her fingers around his hand, tearing up
as his voice choked.
“There are a couple of you who’ve requested to remain anonymous, but you know who you are, who played a key role in finally allowing justice to be served. And for that, we owe you a debt we can never repay, as well as our eternal love and friendship. You helped bring our family back together.”
She squeezed his hand, sniffling back her own tears and glancing down when she felt someone pressing a tissue into her other hand. Loren gave her a smile and backed away with the box in her hand.
Walt paused for a moment. “When I met Holly, I’d honestly hit a point in my life where I’d pretty much accepted this was it. I had friends, I had play partners, I had an extended family who loved and welcomed me, but I didn’t have a life partner. I didn’t have someone who I could love and take care of and be there for.” He looked down at her. “Then I had to convince her that a sadist means many things, not just one thing.”
She laughed, giving him a smile, his blue eyes staring down into hers.
“She loves me, and I want to spend the rest of my life with her, waking up with her every day, going to bed with her every night.” He had to let go of her hand to pull the pouch out of his pocket and take the bracelet out. “This is her collar, even though she’ll wear it on her wrist. She physically can’t wear a collar, but a collar around someone’s neck doesn’t mean anything if they’re not collared in their heart and soul to their Dominant or Owner or Master. So I don’t care that it’s on her wrist. Because I can see her collar in the way she serves me every day, in every look she gives me, in the trust she’s placed in me.”
He fastened it around her right wrist, then cupped her hand in his and stared down at her. “In front of all our friends, will you please consent to be my slave?”
She nodded. “I’m proud to be your slave, Sir.”
Everyone broke into applause as he helped her to her feet and kissed her, fisting her hair and tipping her back, just a little, his arms supporting her.
She didn’t panic, knowing he’d never let her go.
* * * *
They didn’t stay at the club very late. They returned to Walt’s house, where he soon had her naked on her back on a towel on the bed, the TENS unit already cranked up.
He held up a tube of lube and a condom. “Someone’s ass is getting fucked tonight, baby. My ass. Eh, by my ass, I mean your ass.”
Her heart raced even as she grinned. “Yes, Sir. This ass.”
“Exactly. Thank you. That’s what I meant.” He pulled on a glove he’d also brought out and slowly started lubing and loosening her rim. He’d spent weeks working her up to the largest butt plug, and knew she could take it.
Meanwhile, he had a vibrating egg happily humming away on low inside her pussy, the remote control on the bed next to the TENS unit controller.
And her arms were clipped over her head, in the padded cuffs.
Subspace didn’t have to call very loud or long for her to deeply dive into it and start floating around. Had she worried she wasn’t enough to keep him happy?
What an idiot she’d been not to believe him in the beginning.
He took great pleasure in all the little tortures he could do, ones that usually had the added bonus of helping her on the back end in terms of pain management. She’d actually been able to back off one of her medications to half the dose, her pain levels were so consistently low now. Her doctor said it was probably a combination of the stress reduction of having Louis home as well as the “alternative medicine” treatments she was using, but Holly knew the simple truth—a large chunk of it was Walt and the rapport and trust they had.
After he had her loosened up, he stripped off the glove before rolling the condom down his shaft and slathering it with lube. “Ready, baby?”
“Yes, Sir. Please fuck me!”
He increased the TENS unit setting, making her wince until he bumped up the vibrator’s setting, making her moan.
Pressing the head of his cock against her rim, he slowly worked it forward, torturously slow, occasionally reaching down to play with her clit with his fingers as he did.
Overload. Pure, sweet, lovely overload. She writhed, helpless and enjoying it and knowing he was enjoying it even more than she was, if that was possible.
Oh, was it ever.
The sadist finally bottomed out inside her before he picked up the TENS unit and bumped it up again, making her grit her teeth against the stinging pain before he turned the vibrator up to full.
And she crashed, hard, sweet, and deep. Her ass clamped down around his cock, drawing a moan from him, too, even as she was coming.
“Good girl,” he said. “You keep doing that and I won’t be able to hold out long.”
In fact, he started moving, fucking her, picking up the pace hard and fast until he was groaning in relief and fumbling for the controllers to shut the vibrator and TENS unit off.
Kneeling there between her legs, braced with one arm, he started chuckling.
She was still trying to catch her breath. “What, Sir?”
He kissed her. “You damn near squeezed my cock off. I’ll have to remember that particular combination of sensory overload.”
“It felt good, Sir.”
He leaned in and nibbled on her lower lip. “You sure you want to put up with me for life?”
She grinned. “Too late. You broke it, you bought it.”
That made him laugh. “Broke it?”
“Well, fixed it. Trained it. Trained me. And I fell in love with you, so there’s that.”
“Love you, too, sweetheart.”
After cleaning up and returning to bed, he cuddled her against him. “Ooh, by the way, keep an eye out for an Amazon order tomorrow at your house.”
“Why? What is it?”
“I picked up a few things for Sasha.”
“Like what?”
“Just…stuff.”
“What stuff?”
He sighed. “A few toys, a new collar, and an adorable doggy tutu.”
She giggled. “Seriously?”
“It was being worn by a greyhound in the picture. I had to buy it. I can’t have another dog looking better than her, can I?”
She snorted. “Oh, boy.”
“What?”
She sighed. “Nothing. You’re adorable, Sir. I’m sure Louis will think it’s cute, too.”
“You don’t think he’ll be mad that I bought her stuff, will he?”
“No, Sir. I think he’ll think it’s adorable, too.”
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Seven weeks after Louis’ homecoming, Holly sat in a camp chair on the Luzons’ screened lanai as a ceiling fan gently blew cool air onto her in the slightly muggy evening. In the backyard, Louis, Walt, and Cedro Luzon were trying to assemble a new propane grill. Sasha lay in the grass nearby, a chew toy in her mouth as she happily worked on it.
Behind Holly, the sliding glass doors slid open and closed again.
“Lord, please don’t let those men set fire to Momma’s azalea bushes. She’ll skin ’em all.” Kimbra held out a cold glass of ice water for Holly.
“Thanks.” She took the glass and Kimbra settled into the chair next to Holly. “They are reading the instructions, if that means anything.”
“There’s a first time for everything.” Kimbra sipped from her bottle of root beer. “Yo, Papi,” she called out. “Momma can always broil the burgers in the oven.”
He waggled a finger at her through the screen as Kimbra softly cackled.
“Is your mom really okay with me and Walt?” Holly asked.
Kimbra reached over and laced fingers with her but didn’t squeeze. “Yeah. You and Louis done been adopted by my whole family, girl. You realize that, right?”
Holly looked at her. “You have no idea how thankful I am to you.”
“Lynn gets a huge chunk of the credit. Weren’t for her, we couldn’t have gotten the testing done. Not as fast, that’s for sure. Not all the evidence at once.”
“But if it hadn’t b
een for you, she might not have offered to pay for the DNA testing. You convinced her. You’re the one who found the evidence in the first place.”
“I did my job.” With her other hand, Kimbra lifted the bottle to her lips again and took another sip. “Makin’ a difference. That’s what I wanted to do when I got my law degree. Most days, it doesn’t feel like it. I know a lot of the people I represent are guilty. I’m lucky when I can get some of them to take plea deals. Then there are clients like Louis, where I know it’s all been worth it. Where I know what I did was good, and right, and powerful.”
“I feel like I hit the lottery. After fighting so hard for so long, it doesn’t feel real.”
“Relax and enjoy, girl.” Kimbra lightly patted the back of Holly’s hand before releasing her. “I’m glad the two of you found each other for a bunch of reasons. He’s been lonely for a long time. I won’t deny I’ve felt sort of guilty about that.”
“Why?”
“Because I didn’t put my foot down sooner. There were a few times, early on, where we fooled around after we got divorced. I knew I’d never get back together with him, and I should have stood my ground. I’m afraid I might have given him false hope by doing that. But now he’s got you, and you’re good for him. I want to see him move on with his life with someone good for him.”
“I think he’s better for me than I am for him.”
“Don’t be too sure about that. This is the most I’ve seen him smile in a long time. And that’s a mighty pretty ring on your finger. Not to mention that bracelet.” She smiled as Holly glanced at her left hand, at the engagement ring.
Of course Kimbra knew what the bracelet signified. She knew about that side of their relationship.
If it were up to Walt, they’d get married in a huge ceremony with the whole Luzon family and all their friends there.
All Holly wanted was something simple, just them, Louis, Walt’s parents, Kimbra and her family, and a couple of their closest friends. “Wait. You’re a notary, aren’t you?” Holly asked.
“Yeah, why?”