Merediths Awakening (20 page)

“I’m not damaged, Mistress,” the slave gasped. “It hurts, but the pain just makes the pleasure deeper.”

Anne’s smile was feline and frightening. “Very good, love. A perfect answer,” she purred. “Now, let’s show Master A’s little toy how a good slave takes his punishment for his Mistress’ pleasure.”

The slave gave a small whimper, and Tony braced himself and Meredith for what would come next.

*

Somehow, the Domme managed to position herself so Meredith got a perfect view as the crop made contact with her slave’s chest.

“She’ll keep the blows light at first,” Tony explained softly as the slave whimpered.

“She’ll want to warm him up. If she slashed away at him cold, the pleasure wouldn’t outweigh the pain.”

Mistress Anne was working the crop slowly and methodically over Patrick’ torso, and the slave swayed under the blows like a willow in the wind.

Meredith watched, and Anthony continued to prepare her ass for his possession.

After several minutes of light, deliberate whipping, Patrick’s gleaming skin was flushed a rich, rosy red. Mistress Anne paused and knelt beside him. Leaning over, she flickered her tongue lightly over his nipples, then bit down hard, causing the slave to hiss in an agony of pleasure.

Satisfied, she settled back on her heels, thighs open wide for her slave’s famished eyes, and began to work another layer of lashes over his heaving chest.

“Now she’ll begin to mark him,” Tony whispered, rotating his fingers maddeningly in her anus, drawing long, high, cries from her throat.

And that’s exactly what the Domme did. Still slow, still methodical, almost impersonally, the woman layered lash upon lash until a pattern of small, triangle-shaped marks formed on the slave’s chest, abdomen, thighs. His face had gone red, and a glaze of sweat and tears joined the honey of his Mistress, sheening his beautiful face. His hips began to pulse, his cock in its harness swayed with each blow. Meredith was afraid, cock ring or not, Patrick was going to come, and soon. She couldn’t even begin to fathom what his punishment might be.

She was so caught up in the scene playing out in front of her she almost didn’t notice when Tony withdrew from her. Almost. When her head whipped to the side to catch sight of him, he tapped her lower lip with a finger that tasted of her, and directed her to look forward. Taking a deep breath, she concentrated on the Mistress and her slave, and tried not to wonder what her own Dom was up to now.

*

He was gone less than a minute, and when he returned, so did her nerves. Working silently, he quickly fastened a harness around her waist, threading two straps between her legs to clip to the back of the harness.

Mistress Anne was still working her slave, and he looked about to break. His eyes, wide and glazed with tears, locked on Meredith, on Tony’s hands on Meredith, and Meredith suddenly realized that even now Tony was touching her with tenderness. A tenderness clearly missing from the Domme’s treatment of her slave.

All at once the Domme looked up, and Meredith could tell her eyes met Tony’s.

Giving a sharp nod, the woman stepped back from her slave and moved around behind him. Then Meredith lost all sense of what was happening in the other room, because Tony was working a previously unseen dildo into her spasming pussy, securing it in place with the harness, and pressing warm, wet kisses over her neck and shoulders as she screamed against the pleasure.

When her screams had subsided to raw whimpers, Tony cupped a palm over her pussy and whispered, “Is this mine?” When she sobbed and nodded against his chest, he said “Not good enough. Tell me.”

“Yours,” she screamed, eyes locked with those of the slave who watched each movement with desperate greed.

“My what,” he was relentless.

“Your pussy,” she sobbed.

His hand moved to her face, cupping her mouth.

“My what,” his voice was nearly as raw as hers.

“Your mouth.”

His hand moved to her bottom, fingers probing the dark crevasse.

“My what,” he was practically growling.

“Your ass, your pussy, your mouth,” she couldn’t stop; she could feel herself preparing to fly and clung frantically to reality. “It’s all yours, Anthony. Every bit of me is yours.”

The black velvet of the mask stuck to her face, glued there by the moisture of her tears.

“I’m going to fuck my ass now, Princess.” She felt something hard and slick and significantly larger than his fingers pressing against her puckered entrance. The pressure dragged a raw, primal cry from her, and Tony paused and grunted, “You are so tight, so hot.” He pressed harder against her protesting opening, and she cried out again, and even she couldn’t have said if it was from the pleasure or the pain.

“Is it too hot, Princess? Do you need to ask for something cooler?” Even in her delirium, she recognized once again he was offering her an out.

It was enough to ground her, and staring into the eyes of the slave who faced her, she took a deep breath and rasped out, “No, not too hot. Anthony, please, tell me how to do this.” His hand stroked over her head so tenderly it renewed her tears. Patrick followed the motion with a look of hopeless longing, and Meredith cried even harder.

“You are so beautiful,” Tony praised her, “so perfect when you surrender to me. My most beloved,” he wrapped one brawny arm around her, drawing her into the warmth of his body. “Don’t you see what we could have if you’d just give yourself to me?” Pressing his cock more firmly against her dark flower, he hardened his voice and began to instruct her. “Take a deep breath, and when you blow out I want you to relax completely. Bear down on me, push against my entrance.” She struggled to follow his directions and wailed aloud as he burrowed into her, inch by inch.

“Oh, fuck Princess. You’ll burn me alive.” He dug further in, and there was a sudden give, and he was all the way inside, that maddening little bar-bell dragging over painfully sensitive tissues. “So fucking tight, so fucking mine,” he pulsed against her, and the pain bloomed, burned, transformed into a dark pleasure she knew would ultimately consume her.

When Tony settled into a slow, driving rhythm, the Domme, who’d been watching them with interest, dropped to her knees behind her slave. Moving in tandem with Tony, she grasped the marble cock impaling Patrick, and began a slow thrust and retreat that had the slave quickly moaning and jerking into each penetration.

“Watch him watch you,” Tony growled into her neck, his voice so thick she almost couldn’t understand him. “You are the most beautiful, the hottest thing he’s ever seen.

Watching you, he wants to feel what I’m feeling. Your wet, tight little pussy.” He jolted the dildo inside her, and she caught her breath. Just a move more and she’d be done, gone, over the rainbow. “He wants to be in this scalding little ass,” and with each thrust, Meredith flew higher. “But he won’t ever be,” the slave was watching, listening to every word, and he looked as desperate for satisfaction as Meredith felt. “He never will because this pussy,” he jerked at the dildo and Meredith shrieked, “this ass,” he plunged deeper still, balls deep, “is mine.”

It was all piling up on her again. Mistress Anne, fucking Patrick brutally. The slave, eyes locked to her, face contorted with lust and desire. Tony powering into her soul by way of her body. Her moans were constant; the tears were a river, cleansing her of fear and pain.

And Tony knew, as he always seemed to do, exactly what she needed.

“Ask for it, Princess,” he sounded almost as frantic as she felt.

“Let me come,” her voice was raw, barely audible.

“That’s not asking, sweet, and not the way I’ve taught you.” And he continued relentlessly pounding into her, stimulating nerve endings she hadn’t known existed.

“Please, Anthony, please let me come,” she was crying now, shamelessly. “Please come inside me, give me you.”

“Fuck, Meredith,” the words tore out of him, and his hips slammed against her ass.

“Come, baby, come for me now.”

It hit her like a flash flood, a bomb blast, lifting her and sending her flying. As she began to convulse, clenching against the dildo, writhing on Tony’s cock, the Domme flicked a hand down and released the cock harness on her slave. As Meredith screamed and shuddered, as Tony arched into her with a shout of his own, the slave’s eyes widened and he let loose a primal scream which seemed to hold all the yearning in the world and began to shoot onto the floor, onto the glass of the window, long pearly ropes of cum.

And then Meredith didn’t see anything. Her eyes were closed, she thought, but she was surrounded, saturated with a brilliant white light.

Tony was vaguely aware of Anne releasing her slave from his bonds as he slumped, boneless over Meredith’s wilted body. The young man looked up at him through tear-spiked lashes, and whispered in a broken voice, “Is she your only?” Suppressing a flicker of pity, he met the boy’s eyes and nodded.

After she’d guided him to the door leading to a small wash area, Anne turned to Tony and said wryly, “That’s the last time I do this with you. You’ll steal all the good slaves!”

“No worries,” he responded, wishing she would just go. He didn’t need her to speak and devalue what he’d just shared with Meredith. “I’m not looking for a slave.” He slowly pulled out, groaning as her still-twitching muscles caressed him all the way. “I’m looking to own her as much as she owns me.” Ignoring her raised eyebrows, Tony sent the Domme a tired smile and closed the curtain in her face.

*

When Meredith woke, she wasn’t entirely sure where she was. Her whole body felt raw, achy. Slowly she became aware of a warm cloth stroking slowly down her throat, over her breasts to rasp over swollen and tender nipples.

The cloth disappeared, and then returned re-heated to move further south. It passed gently through the folds of her labia, soothing irritated, abused flesh.

Eventually she realized she was naked, stretched out on a soft mattress covered with a fluffy silken covering.

“Welcome back,” Tony murmured roughly, and she wondered how he’d known she was awake.

“Hmmm. Where was I?” she asked, and hardly recognized her raspy voice. “And where am I now?”

He’d finished bathing her, and she heard the cloth land in a basin of water with a soft plop. Shifting her to her side, and petting her when her muscles protested and she groaned, he slid into the bed behind her, drawing her back to spoon against him.

“You’re with me, Meredith.” Surrounded by his warmth, caressed by Tony’s richly accented voice, she thought that just might be answer enough. “Right at this second, you are completely with me.”

He petted her hair, smoothing the damp strands away from her face. “Can you sleep a while?”

Her automatic response was no, but she checked herself before she said it. Taking a quick physical inventory, she realized if he stayed wrapped around her, keeping her safe and warm, she could finally rest.

“Yeah,” she murmured. Without opening her eyes, she found his hand and lifted it to her lips. She pressed her lips to his knuckles, then rubbed her cheek against his palm, and wondered at how he caught his breath with the action. “If you stay with me, I can rest a while.”

*

Tony didn’t want to sleep. He wanted to savor every moment of holding his woman.

Her surrender, her trust was so precious and so fleeting he didn’t want to waste a second in sleep.

She wrecked him. Absolutely destroyed him. He’d known from the beginning he was hers. Known from the get-go winning her would be an uphill battle. He’d even known he’d be fighting the ghosts of her past in order to win her. He just hadn’t anticipated the depth of her hurt, the extent of her wounds. And he could never have planned for how her rejections wounded him.

When she’d left him, like a thief in the night, the hurt had been paralyzing. It was even worse when he realized why she’d left. In his need to protect her, he was feeding into her belief that men could not be trusted. She felt he was holding back, and had no reason to trust he’d never hold back on the important stuff.

Even understanding her hurt, he couldn’t tell her about the drugs. He couldn’t expose her to the threat, to that kind of danger. The very idea made his chest tight, and his stomach churn. She was his. His to protect. His to pleasure. Putting her in harm’s way was as likely as cutting off his right arm.

*

Meredith had no idea how long she’d slept, but she woke feeling weak, like someone who’d weathered a serious illness and had just come out the other side. Tony’s arms were still wrapped around her, and the feeling of security it gave her was unfamiliar and scary.

It would be all too easy to come to depend on his strength, and the idea of depending on anyone terrified her.

She felt when he realized she was awake in the slight tensing of his arms, like he was afraid she’d try to pull away. She felt his deep breath as he deliberately relaxed, and the warmth of his lips on her shoulder.

“They aren’t like us,” she finally said, surprised again at the raspy sound of her voice.

“No,” he agreed quietly. “They aren’t.”

Now that her mind was functioning, she tried to puzzle it out. “She didn’t care about him at all, did she? His orgasm was more of a punishment than a reward.” Tony murmured his agreement, so she continued. “And she never came.” Tony sighed against her neck and explained, “Mistress Anne is a lifestyler. She lives her entire life as a Domme; it’s not just about sex for her. She doesn’t have a relationship with Patrick, or with any of her slaves. She’s looking for release, and for her it doesn’t come from orgasm, it comes from utterly breaking someone else until they have nothing left but their trust for her.”

“That’s what you want from me,” Meredith mused, “and at the same time it’s not.

It’s hard for me to understand the difference.”

She could tell from the way he went carefully still, and his voice went deliberately neutral, she’d hurt him again. The knowledge hurt her. She really wasn’t trying to push him away this time. This time she was truly trying to understand what was happening between them.

“Please, Anthony.” He tensed a bit at her use of his full name, and she regretted hurting him, “I’m not arguing, or accusing. I know you can explain this to me, and I need to understand.”

He sighed again, and rolled her over to face him. His face was so beautiful in the dim light. His eyes dark, liquid pools.

“For Anne, working a slave is about power. Her power. And you’re right, it’s nothing like what we do together.” He paused and stroked his fingers through her hair, seeming to think about his words carefully. “I’m not looking for a slave, or even a submissive 24/7. I don’t dominate you to control you, or to steal your power. I dominate you because it’s the way I can best cherish you. For a Domme like Anne, it’s about power. For me, with you, it’s about giving and receiving.

“You have as much power, more even, than I do when we make love.” He smiled at her startled expression. “Hard to reconcile, isn’t it? Straps and gags and masks, how can that be making love?” He cupped her face in his palms, intent. “But it is. Everything we do, every touch, is making love because of what is in here,” he placed his hand on her forehead, “and in here,” his hand moved to shelter her heart.

“God,” she groaned. “You overwhelm me. You bulldoze me.” She shook her head helplessly, enchanted by the idea that this remarkable, generous man might really love her, but unable to move around her realistic views to believe it.

“How can you love me?” Her question was disturbingly plaintive. “You don’t know me, Tony.” He started to protest, and she laid her fingers over his lips. “You don’t. You know the news stories, you know my body, but how can you know my mind and heart?” She forced herself to meet his eyes. The pain there mirrored the pain she knew he could see in her own.

“Let me tell you what I know,” he insisted gruffly. “You’re right, I do know your body. I know how sweet you taste, and how perfectly you melt over me and match me.

And I know the news stories, enough that if your father weren’t already dead, I’d kill him myself.” She felt a warm little glow kindle somewhere around where her heart used to be.

“But I know so much more,” he continued. “I know your ambition; I know you’re driven to succeed not only for yourself, but for those who depend on you. I know you’re loyal to the bitter end, and try to be objective, even when it hurts. I know your sense of humor, and the sense of the ridiculous you try so hard to keep hidden. I know you’re scary smart, and a force to be reckoned with, and that’s wicked sexy. I know you’ve been betrayed and wounded, and think you’ve forgotten how to trust, and I know for brief instants you’ve trusted me completely.”

He pressed his forehead to hers, letting his eyes burn a path to her soul. “I
know
you Meredith. And I love what I know.”

“I can’t…” in the face of his utter emotional surrender, it was hard to find words. “I want to believe you.”

“Then believe.”

“I want what you’re offering me, so much.”

“It’s yours, I’m yours for the taking.”

“You say you know me,” she pressed her fingers to his lips again to still his protest.

“Maybe you do know me. But Tony, I don’t know you, not that way.” She saw the frustration kindle in those beautiful, melted chocolate eyes, and tried to find the words to make him understand.

“You said you’d been preparing for me, planning for five years. I’ve had less than five days. My life, my family is public. Yours is a mystery to me. You know what made me who I am. I know you’ve got a remarkable Grandmother, but I don’t know your parents, your childhood.

“I know you say you belong to me and you need my trust, but at the same time I know you’re keeping secrets.”

Tony was silent for a while, long enough for Meredith to fear she’d ruined everything. It was a surprisingly painful thought. She felt so close to him, so vulnerable.

The idea by opening up she might have pushed him away was heartbreaking.

*

Tony needed a minute. He had to wade through the stew of emotions her words had stirred up. It was maddening to him she couldn’t just fall into his open arms, full of love and trust. But every word she’d said had been true. He’d known it all along, but for the first time he really understood.

“You need time, huh?” She nodded, and the apprehension on her face tore at him. He never wanted to put that look in her eyes.

“Okay, then. We’ll take some time. You’re right, you do need to catch up. To get to know me. So we’ll do that.”

His reward was more than he could have hoped for. A slow, delighted smile dawned on her face; her eyes glowed with pleasure and relief. Moving impulsively for maybe the first time, she slid into his arms, holding him tight.

“Thank you,” she whispered into his neck in between light, butterfly kisses. “I want this so much. Thank you for giving us this chance.”