The Mark of an Alpha (13 page)

A minute later he was down the stairs. The other wolves looked up as he strode through the living room.

"Everything's fine. I'm just going out for a little while. Steffan—you're in charge until we get back. Don't wait up."

[Back to Table of Contents]

Bennett held the folded piece of paper tight in his hand as he waited for the man behind the bar to give him the key.

In a stupid way, the command in the note was almost a relief at this point.

The human behind the bar didn't seem to be in any sort of rush. He was looking at the wall behind the bar more than looking for the key. Bennett followed his gaze. Clock. Midnight. He'd not only made it there in time, he was a few minutes early. His master said he could have the key at midnight.

His master. For tonight, it might be safe to call him that. One night. He would do whatever Marsdon wanted. It would be fitting punishment for the stupid accusation that wounded his mate so deeply, for all the things he had screwed up since he became the other man's mate rather than his submissive.

That was right. He would take his punishment, Marsdon would be pleased with him, and they would finally be able to close the door on all this. Bennett nodded to himself. Punishment... right...

The clock clicked over to midnight. The human gave him the key. His feet traced the familiar path to the back room—to their room. His mind swirled with trying to guess if there would be more instructions on another note waiting for him inside the room. Marsdon had always been very specific about how he wanted him to present himself ready for each meeting.

Unlocking the door into the back room, Bennett took half a step in, and then stalled on the threshold. He stood there, still and silent, just staring at the scene before him.

Footsteps reached his ears. Bennett looked around and saw someone walking down the corridor towards him. Quickly stepping inside the room, he slammed the door shut before anyone else could see his master like that. He sucked in a deep breath, filling his lungs with the scent of leather and sex and his master.

Bennett's eyes ran over the other wolf. The leather around his wrists and ankles held him spread in exactly the same way he himself had been bound that last night they'd shared together. A blindfold hid his eyes but his mouth was free. Marsdon still didn't say anything.

"Sir?” Bennett whispered, before he could stop himself. He bit his lip to stop himself from saying anything else, but there was no hiding from the fact that in this room Marsdon would always be sir. Even if he couldn't face that fact in the outside world, in this room, he was with his master and that would always be a pleasure rather than a punishment.

Marsdon made no response.

Bennett took a step forward. “What are you—?"

"There's nothing shameful about offering yourself to your mate."

Bennett pushed his hair back from his eyes as he cautiously made his way around his master to stand in front of him. Tension filled every line of the other wolf's body. His hands were clenched into fists above the cuffs encircling his wrists.

"I don't understand,” Bennett whispered, his eyes flickering back and forth over his mate's exposed body.

Marsdon bit back a laugh. “That's the point, isn't it? You don't understand that this has nothing to do with being a wolf or an alpha or anything else. So..."

Bennett frowned. “So you're...submitting to me?"

Marsdon took a deep breath. “Yes."

Bennett couldn't make his throat work.

"We'll take it in turns,” Marsdon said.

"What?"

Marsdon took another deep breath, seemingly more in frustration than anything else. “We'll take it in turns."

"You don't want this,” Bennett blurted out.

"Yes, I do."

"Don't lie to me,” Bennett snapped. “I've been in those chains. I know what loving every moment you spend in them feels like. You hate it."

"It's not a problem."

"Yes, it is.” His master in chains was a problem. Marsdon expecting him to be his master's master was a problem. “If this is some sort of joke..."

"You think I'd—” Marsdon cut himself off and took another of those deep breaths. “If this is the only way you can have this, I'll do it."

"What?"

"If the only way you can believe there's nothing wrong with submitting to your mate is to see me do it just as often as you do then...then I'll do it.” The last few words were whispered.

Bennett stepped forward and touched his master's cheek just below the line of the blindfold. Marsdon tensed.

He hated it. Bennett could see it in every line of his body. Marsdon hated being out of control. He hated being in bondage. He hated submitting.

He hated it almost as much as he loved his mate.

Bennett rested his forehead against Marsdon's forehead, barely daring to breathe. “You deserve so much better,” he whispered. “It's bad enough that I drop so easily to my knees. I shouldn't drag you down with me."

He reached out to undo one of the cuffs and free his master.

"Don't you dare!"

Bennett snatched his hand away from the buckle. “I was just going to—"

"And I said don't."

"I thought—"

"Don't think. Just do as you're told."

Bennett dropped his gaze as a part of him that had been kept too tightly corralled for too long howled its relief at suddenly being given the freedom to just let everything go and exist in a world of his master's making.

Marsdon dropped his head back and sighed his frustration to the ceiling. “Do what you want,” he corrected. “You have the rest of the night. Do whatever you want with me."

Bennett tried to pull that part of him that gloried in submission back under his conscious control, to slip the tight lead back around its neck and tame it. But the harder he tried, the more his mind just spiralled out of control.

Without thinking he reached out to his master, placing his palm over Marsdon's heart. His mate's pulse raced just as fast as his own, but there was still reassurance to be found in the steady rhythm.

Leaning forward, Bennett rested his head on Marsdon's shoulder, just as Marsdon had asked him to do a few days before when they were in the barn. It felt different here. Safe in the club away from the real world, it was almost as if it didn't really count.

His eyes traced a line up Marsdon's arm to the cross on the inside of his forearm. His fingers followed quickly behind.

"There's a knife on the table if you want it."

Bennett shook his head, tracing the scar with his fingertips. He'd never been able to find an excuse to touch it before. They both reached for the back of his neck and sought for what that meant. By comparison, Marsdon's scar had been ignored.

Do you really think I'd cut you without knowing what I was doing?

Bennett bit his lip.

Marsdon hadn't hesitated to try it first, to be sure it wouldn't hurt his lover past what he deemed acceptable. He hadn't hesitated to put himself in bondage when he thought that would ease his pain. It wasn't as if Marsdon wanted the mark, as if he took any pleasure from being bound. A glance down Marsdon's body was enough to make that quite clear.

Marsdon hadn't hesitated to accept everything about him, even when it couldn't have been what he'd expected to find in his mate. Marsdon had never done anything but accept him. Right then, that made everything very simple.

Bennett closed his eyes and lowered himself slowly to his knees in front of his master.

Marsdon stared into the blackness behind the blindfold as Bennett rested his forehead against his stomach in exactly the same way he had the last time they were in the room.

"It's okay, pup,” he whispered.

Bennett's gasp sucked a deep lungful of air across his stomach, but he made no objection to the name or the reassurance.

Marsdon blindly felt his way forward in a conversation that wasn't going at all as he expected. “That's right,” he soothed. “Your master's got you safe now."

He reached out to touch Bennett's hair, to tangle the fingers in the long strands of hair and welcome his lover close, eager to praise him for letting himself do that. A chain rattled. A cuff tugged at his wrist.

Bennett began to pull away. “Let me, sir."

"I didn't give you permission to move."

For a second he sensed nothing. Then he felt the soft movement of the air brushing against his body as Bennett subsided back to his knees. His mate's forehead came to rest once more against his stomach. “Yes, sir."

Marsdon bowed his head to stare down at his lover, as if he would suddenly develop the ability to see through that stupid blindfold. He could picture Bennett so clearly, kneeling there so uncertain about it all, so convinced that what he wanted was wrong.

"Hush,” Marsdon whispered. “Just stay right where you are. Your master will tell you when he wants you to do anything else."

"Yes, sir."

Bennett's lips were just a fraction of an inch from Marsdon's skin. He felt the air brush across his stomach as he spoke, felt the flicker of lips against his abs as he formed each word.

"Rest your hands on me. Both of them. On my flanks."

Bennett's hands touched his skin, resting very gently on his sides.

"Properly. I'm not made of glass."

His lover's hands settled more comfortably. His fingers spread out, as if he wanted to touch as much of his master as possible.

"That's right,” Marsdon soothed. “You keep them there until I tell you to move them."

"Yes, sir."

The words brushed against his skin, but there was a kiss there too. When Bennett held his breath as if waiting for a reprimand for taking liberties, Marsdon knew it hadn't been an accident.

"Yes, pup,” he said. “I did notice. Did you think I wouldn't?"

"Sorry, sir,” Bennett whispered. There was no attempt to drop another kiss onto the same spot.

"You don't have permission to kiss your master."

"I—"

"If you want to please me, you may lick me, pup,” he cut in.

Bennett's tongue touched his stomach very gently. Marsdon itched to be able to reach down and rest his hand on the back of his head, to reassure him his master was pleased with him. But he'd have to get Bennett off his knees if he wanted to be released, he'd have to break the moment if he wanted to see and he couldn't take that risk. All he had was his voice.

"That's right,” he praised.

His pup's tongue flickered out more confidently, lapping at his stomach, searching for a deeper connection with every taste he took of his master's body. His grip on Marsdon's sides tightened.

"You can move your mouth, pup, but your hands stay where they are."

The reply might have been ‘Yes, sir'. It was hard to tell when Bennett's tongue never ceased tracing patterns over his skin.

Blind, Marsdon could only imagine how beautiful his pup would be right then. The light of submission just beginning to flicker to life in his eyes. The peace of knowing he belonged to his master just starting to settle over him. There were still hesitations. Every so often he felt Bennett tense, felt his pup's hold on him tighten as his mate fought against the instinct to pull away and deny that part of himself.

"That's right,” Marsdon said, more in praise for Bennett's attempts to push past his fears surrounding his submission than anything else.

Bennett's tongue lapped lower down his stomach, tracing a direct line to his cock. Marsdon took a deep breath as he felt the blood race to his shaft in anticipation.

His mate whimpered his pleasure when he noticed that.

Marsdon chuckled. “As if there was any chance I wouldn't,” he teased. And then he realised. Bennett had never actually seen the way his master reacted to him when he knelt before him. The hood had hidden everything from him, just as Marsdon's blindfold hid Bennett from him right then.

Bennett ran his tongue along the length of Marsdon's cock, over and over again, from the head all the way to the root as the shaft filled with blood and stiffened under his tongue.

He murmured his pleasure again, as he dropped his attention to the tight sacs below and laved them with his tongue as he nuzzled his way past Marsdon's cock.

His fingers clenched and unclenched at Marsdon's sides, as his tongue began to work more feverishly at his crotch. Marsdon's own hands wrapped themselves into fists as he fought against the need to touch, to control.

"Kiss,” he managed to order.

The instant the word hit the air, Bennett's lips touched his skin. They began to work in harmony with Bennett's agile tongue as he turned his attention back to his master's cock to trace the line of the vein under his shaft as his cock curved enthusiastically up to his stomach.

The sounds of Bennett's pleasure with his task filled the room as he focused in on the head, lapping and kissing the sensitive glans until Marsdon couldn't stay still under his ministrations. His hips rocked, his ankles pulled at the leather wrapped around them.

How Bennett managed to find any pleasure in this infuriating position was beyond him. Marsdon tried to push down his irritation, to calm his desire to move, to come, to do anything other than fail to give his mate as much time as he could to settle into what he was doing.

"Mouth now!” he finally demanded, when waiting any longer would have driven him completely insane.

Bennett's mouth engulfed him in warm, wet suction. His hands slid around to scrabble at his master's backside, encouraging Marsdon to thrust into his mouth as much as the damn bondage would allow.

Marsdon growled his frustration at the ceiling as he tossed his head back. Bennett whimpered around his cock, sucking hard as he worked frantically at the tip, begging the orgasm out of him as if that was the one thing that would make everything right with both their worlds.

Heat exploded through his body without warning. It shot along his spine, ripping a howl from him as he came onto Bennett's tongue, tugging at every point of bondage. Chains rattled. His howl echoed around the room.

In the stillness that came after it, Marsdon couldn't hear anything but himself panting for breath. His head swirled with the force of the orgasm, but he pulled a deep lungful of air into his body and held it.