One never knows if Master James is mindfucking you or serious, and he had me believing he’d invited people to watch. I’m not a huge exhibitionist, but I’ve been his submissive on stage enough for shows and demonstrations, and had enough orgasms doing so that it’s becoming a little of my kink. Not something I need in order to be fulfilled, but certainly an idea that spices things up a bit in my mind.
He flogged me for a while, then stopped to put a butt plug in before resuming with the flogger. At some point he added nipple clamps and a butterfly vibe, and every time I asked for permission to come, he allowed it.
He let my arms down a few times and tied me bent over a table, but then would string me from the rafters again for a while. He occasionally added earplugs as well, though never more than probably ten minutes at a time. Over the course of about three hours, Master James layered pleasure, agony, bliss, and torment over the top of sensory deprivation, and I managed several dozen orgasms.
Master James didn’t have any orgasms — he never does in my presence. I’ve never seen him in any stage of undress, and yet I feel completely comfortable around him when I’m nude. It took me a while to be okay with it, but I am now.
He held me until I came around, wrapped in a blanket, safe and secure in his arms. When I sat up, he fed me some grapes and then walked me to the Jacuzzi, his arm around me for extra security.
As I soaked, he sat in a chair wearing jeans and a dress shirt, with his legs stretched out in front of him, and we talked about the scene and how various things made me feel. I relaxed in the warm water, my head back and eyes closed, and answered his questions about what turned me on, what I liked, and what I wasn’t thrilled about. This used to be so hard for me, but now it’s just part of the scene. If I hide what I feel and I’m not honest with him, he can’t help me deal with it. He needs to know
everything
if he is to train me properly.
Once I was out of the tub, our conversation turned to mundane topics as I fixed my hair and reapplied my makeup. He handed my clothes to me, I put them back on, and he took me by the hand and walked me to my car with instructions to email him tomorrow morning to tell him how badly I was bruised and marked, and to let him know what hurt and what didn’t. We hugged one last time, a long one where he held me and I knew I was special to him, and I hoped he understood what he meant to me. I don’t love him romantically, but I do love him — it would be impossible to have the level of trust we have without affection and caring.
I called the house phone on the drive home and discovered Xiaolan was preparing dinner, they’d both finished their homework, and Lauren was going over her lines for
Alice
.
Dinner was nearly ready when I walked in the door, and I set the table and took my seat. We had a nice family dinner, and as Lauren and I were finishing the dishes, my cell phone rang. I recognized Kieran’s number and headed up the steps towards my room as I answered.
Xiaolan was in the shower, so she wouldn’t be able to hear my side of the conversation, thank goodness.
“Do you know someone named Abbott?” I asked Kieran as I answered the phone.
“Yes”
“He tried to trick me into admitting I know vampires exist.”
“I do not believe this was his intention.”
“
Right
.”
“He spoke with me Saturday night after you took your leave. He’s hoping to hear from you again, once you’ve verified his identity with me.”
“He’s your friend?”
“He is more than my friend. He is... kind of my boss. He’s the Master Vampire of this area. Not just Chattanooga, but most of the southeastern United States. He’s quite powerful.”
“And what does he want from me?”
“He is intrigued by you, and this has not happened for a very long time.”
“And if I turn him down, is he going to vamp out on me?”
“Vamp out?”
“Stop avoiding the question. What happens if I don’t call him back? Will he come after me?”
“I do not know what will happen. I do not believe you are in danger of harm from him, but I also do not believe he will allow you to walk away with no further contact. He will talk to you at the theater, and he will likely continue to try to court you.”
Court me?
Please
. Aaron occasionally came up with what I considered out-of-date words and phrases, too. Apparently, this was a common thing amongst ancient supernaturals. “And you don’t believe he was trying to trick me into breaking my word?”
“No, my lady. I believe he felt you could tell he was vampire and thus would have no problems talking to him about it. It’s a bit of a conundrum that you can stop us from entering your mind, and yet you can’t tell what we are.”
“Speaking of which, can Abbott read minds? Or does he just read auras?”
“Miss O’Shea,” he said, his voice a warning, “you ask dangerous questions.”
“Yeah, it’s like a gift. Are you going to answer my dangerous question?”
“I think it best if you ask this of Abbott.”
“Is the danger to me for asking, or to you for answering?”
“The latter.”
“Okay, one more question and I’ll let you go. You said he’s the Master Vampire of the Southeast. Does he have some sort of title? Is there a formal way he should be addressed?”
“Again, you ask dangerous questions. I will not tell you the formal wording. I will tell you his name is his title, though. He is
The Abbott
.”
His speech was so formal, I felt the need to be flippant to balance things out, so I said, “Oh, well. Alrighty then.”
I’d wondered if Abbott was perhaps only a few hundred years old, because his name hadn’t been in use before then. It didn’t make sense he’d be younger than Kieran and Gwen, and this explained it — assuming his name changed when he took the title. Or, perhaps when he moved to an English speaking country? He spoke as if English were his first language, but I had the sense it wasn’t.
I set the phone aside and stared at the wall as I thought. I wanted to be able to talk to Aaron about this, but with the wording that I couldn’t tell anyone about vampires, I wasn’t sure how to bring it up. The odds are he knew they exist, but I still couldn’t tell him, or even ask. Perhaps I could get him to meet me at the theater when I knew Abbott would be there? Or, perhaps he’d recognize Abbott’s name and I wouldn’t have to tell him anything. I grabbed my cell phone and called him.
He answered with, “Hello, gorgeous.”
I laughed and replied, “Hi, sexy. How are things going?”
“Other than these murders, you mean? At least there haven’t been any other supernatural emergencies. I’ve handed off the entire half-demon problem to someone I trust, and there’ve been no full-demon problems, which you know because if something’d come up you’d have gotten a call to come help. How are things with you?”
“Oh, you know, the usual — working and being a mom and spending way too much time sitting in the back of a theater during practice, and, oh, being romanced by a sexy, rich man.”
“Whoa. You’re being romanced? Someone in that obscene lifestyle of yours, or are you going to break someone else’s heart when you discover they aren’t demented?”
Ouch. Aaron and I had dated once, but it turns out he’s only insanely dominant outside of the bedroom, so our sex life pretty much didn’t work out. He usually just teases me about being demented, but this sounded like maybe things were a bit more raw than I’d thought. Or, maybe he was just having a bad day. I’d need to figure it out, but later, and in person.
“He owns The Diamond Club, so there’s reason to believe he’s a bit twisted, though I don’t know for sure yet. But, you know I finally admitted to myself I’ll never be okay with vanilla, and now I always find out by the third date.”
“The Diamond Club? Please tell me you aren’t talking about Abbott Hamilton.”
“You know him? Doesn’t sound like you’re a fan.”
“I need to speak carefully here, Kirsten. He’s a nice enough guy, and in fact someone I consider a good friend. However, his world is…complicated, and under certain circumstances I’d have a hard time protecting you. If you’re going to get involved with him then I need to jump into action tonight to lay the groundwork to keep you safe.” He took a breath and added, “I can’t say anything else at the moment, so don’t start asking questions and
please
don’t try to figure it out. If you get close it could put you in danger.”
“Aaron, I trust you with my life and I’ll take your advice. If you tell me to stay away from him I will, but I don’t think it’s that easy. Let me just say I need to speak carefully as well, but it appears he’s intrigued by me, he’s pretty intent on romancing me, and isn’t likely to take no for an answer. He’s a large contributor to my daughter’s theater, and apparently intends on being around quite a bit when I’m there.”
There was a long pause and I finally asked, “Aery, are you there?”
“Yes, Bug, I’m just wondering how you manage to get yourself into these situations. Tell me this — are you attracted to him?”
“Yeah, but I could also walk away and not look back, at this point. Though as I said, I don’t think he’s going to let me just walk away with no more contact.”
“Does he know what you’re capable of?”
I took a moment to consider how to answer, and finally said, “Not everything, though he certainly knows I have some pretty good shields.” Technically, I’d probably said too much, because by saying he knew I had shields, I was telling someone Abbott was likely supernatural. I figured it was within the boundaries, though probably not by much.
“You’re doing a good job of getting me the information I need. Let me make a few phone calls. Sit tight until I call you back.”
“Are you sure, Aaron? I don’t want to get you involved in something messy. I don’t know what kinds of politics might be involved but I’m guessing you’re about to dive elbow deep into something smelly.”
“Don’t worry about me; I need a little excitement in my life anyway. Just sit tight until I call you back.”
“Aery?”
“Yeah.”
“I wish things could have worked out between us. I still feel like our hearts are somehow connected, and it makes me sad that the whole couple thing didn’t work, but I’m really glad we’re such good friends.”
“I know, Bug. It’s okay. I’m glad you’re my friend, too. I’ll talk to you later. Don’t speak with Abbott until I speak with you again.” And he hung up.
Maybe I shouldn’t have said that last bit, but I had to. I
was
sad things hadn’t worked between us, and I wanted him to know. One of the most magical nights of my life had been when he’d transformed into a beautiful dragon and flown me around the night sky. We landed on a mountaintop, he shifted back to human form, stretched his cloak out on the ground, and we had what would’ve probably been great vanilla sex if I were into that sort of thing.
The sex would’ve been great as an appetizer; I was incredibly stimulated by it, but there was this tiny orgasm at the end. Ten seconds, tops — and there was only one. I usually can’t orgasm at all during vanilla sex, so the fact I did spoke to how special it was. But, I can’t live with that being the most I can experience, and it wouldn’t have been fair to either of us, anyway. I had dozens of orgasms with James a few hours ago, and the longest orgasm was several minutes long. Vanilla sex is never going to fulfill me.
Aery is my nickname for him — short for Aaron, but also a play on words, since he’s a dragon. I have no idea why he calls me Bug, but when he says it, it works. The nicknames started when we were dating, and it was a long time after we broke up and figured out how to be friends before he called me Bug again. It felt right, though, and I’d started calling him Aery again.
Chapter Seven
I didn’t receive a phone call back, and when I awoke the next morning I checked my phone to see no missed calls and no new messages.
Damn
.
And I was beautifully, wonderfully, sore. Yesterday’s session with Master James had been intense, and I was bruised worse than I’d been in a while. It looked like all surface bruising and welts though, nothing deep. Still, today would be a cotton-undershirt-without-a-bra day. Good thing it was cool enough to wear a sweater so no one would notice.
My phone rang and my heart dropped as I recognized Kieran’s number, and answered with a cautious, “Hello?”
He didn’t sound happy. “This would be the polite questioning instead of the jumping to conclusions you will recall asking for.”
“I appreciate that, and I can assure you I haven’t broken my word.”
Mostly
.
“Then do you mind explaining why all hell is breaking loose and the American liaison to the Interspecies Council has threatened Abbott that you aren’t to be harmed?”
I immediately realized I was likely safe, if some council was saying I wasn’t to be harmed, but decided to continue arguing my case, anyway. I didn’t want the vampires to think I’d gone back on my word. “I had no idea there was even such a thing as an Interspecies Council,” I told him. “I mentioned to my friend Aaron that it appeared I was being romanced by an attractive man, he asked me if this guy was into the lifestyle, I told him I didn’t know but since he owned The Diamond Club I had high hopes he was a bit twisted.” Out of breath, I pulled more air into my lungs and finished my thought, “And then our conversation pretty much went to hell and he told me he’d call me back, but he hasn’t yet.”
“Lifestyle? You’re telling me you’re dominant? Oh
fun
; this is going to be interesting.”
“No, I’m not a sexual dominant. Why would it be interesting?”
“Because Abbott is dominant, and it would be amusing to watch him attempt to romance a Domme. With your power level, I made the wrong assumption. If you’re submissive it won’t be anywhere near as amusing.” He paused. “Your friend Aaron? That wouldn’t be Aaron Drake by any chance, would it?”
I ignored the heat pumping through my veins and going straight to my groin at the news Abbott was a Dom, and answered, “Yes. Why?”