Liam was wearing very soft black leather pants and square-toed boots. His shirt was also silk and at Daniel’s suggestion he’d left it unbuttoned.
The caterers had arrived an hour before, busily setting up the trays of food and getting the open bar ready. A large cooler of ice was filled with chilled bottles of champagne.
Liam took one of the bottles and popped the cork. He poured three glasses and handed one to each of his sexy subs. He had teased them unmercifully all day, interrupting them in whatever they were doing to fondle and arouse them, stopping just before he took them too far. He hadn’t permitted himself to come either, enjoying the steady slow burn of desire along with them.
“Daniel, you know the fun you’re in for and, Alex, you’re about to find out.” He raised his glass. “To a great party.” While they sipped the dry bubbly wine he addressed Alex. “Remember you are to obey everyone wearing black in the room. They all know the limits and rules, the primary ones being no intercourse, no scat or water sports and no blood.
“If you feel you just can’t obey something someone has asked come find me or Daniel and let us know. But think long and hard before you do that. Your job tonight is to please my guests. This isn’t about your pleasure or gratification, though I do hope you have fun and I think you will.
“But your primary goal tonight should be to please any Dom, male or female, who wishes to use you. You’re my property and my possession so your behavior reflects directly on me. Do your very best to please my guests and I promise the rewards will be tenfold.
“Situations can get a little intense sometimes. A list of safewords will be posted in the playroom. Yours is…?”
“Butterfly, Sir,” Alex supplied. She’d never had to use her safeword with them. Liam didn’t believe in pushing a slave so far they panicked. He liked taking them to the edge and perhaps just a little beyond. But in his experience safewords weren’t necessary between people who knew and trusted each other. He was able to read his subs’ cues and body language. He instinctively knew when it was time to back off and had yet to push anyone he’d played with over the years to that limit.
“Good. I don’t expect you to need it but if you really feel you can’t tolerate what’s being asked of you and you can’t make yourself understood in any other way, use your safeword. If you’re gagged, open and close your fists three times in succession. That will be the universal signal tonight for every sub.”
The color had risen to Alex’s cheeks. On an impulse Liam cupped her crotch. Her panties were wet. “Slut.” He grinned, watching her flush deepen. “She’s wet, Daniel. Our sub girl is soaking wet at the thought of servicing our guests.”
Daniel started to respond but closed his mouth. Liam realized he was in full sub mode, and because Liam hadn’t asked a direct question he had no cause to speak. Liam moved in front of him and cradled his restrained balls through the silk. With his other hand he stroked Daniel’s rapidly rising shaft.
“And you,” he whispered. “I want you hard all night. Show them how you burn for me.” He leaned down and kissed Daniel’s mouth. Daniel’s lips parted, his tongue moving out to meet Liam’s. He never tired of Daniel’s kiss, of his supple lips and eager tongue. He forgot about the party, about the girl standing next to them, about everything but the man he owned and loved.
A tiny sound, like a kitten’s plaintive mewling cry, distracted him. Liam pulled away from Daniel to look at Alex, not sure if he’d imagined the sound. She was standing still as a statue, her eyes straight ahead but her hands, he saw, were clenched into fists.
She wants to be kissed.
The thought slipped into his mind and as soon as it did he knew it was true. He had kissed Alex once or twice while fucking her but it had been an afterthought. Unlike when he consciously kissed Daniel, with Alex it was more of a gut response—something to do with his mouth while his cock was inside her. He’d never kissed her with intent, with a focus on her as a lover. She wasn’t their lover, after all. She was their girl toy.
Until that moment he’d believed she was perfectly happy in that role.
Maybe he had imagined the sound. Or maybe he was reading more into it than was there. Still the seed once planted began to grow. What would it be like to kiss Alex without the distraction of sex?
He looked at her lips, plump and rosy, the lower lip pouty above her small pointy chin. Why had he never noticed how lovely her mouth was? He imagined lightly biting those lips, licking along the curve of her mouth, feeling the flicker of her tongue against his.
He moved from Daniel to stand in front of her. She was easily a foot shorter than he while Daniel was only a few inches shorter. He would lift her into his arms and taste her lips. It was his right—she belonged to him. He reached for her and leaned down to kiss her, his cock stiff with desire.
The doorbell rang, distracting Liam. “Our first guests.” He glanced at his watch. It was seven fifty-five. “Five minutes early. I bet it’s Mistress Jade. She loves to arrive unfashionably early.”
He grinned toward Daniel for confirmation and was confused by the flash of silent reproach he saw in his lover’s eyes. But when he looked again it was gone.
By eight thirty the living room was filled with guests. Liam had been correct—Mistress Jade was the first to arrive, her slave Thomas by her side. Jade was imposing, nearly six feet with a large frame and huge breasts squashed into a black leather bustier. She wore a full-length leather skirt and stiletto boots with long pointed toes. Her hair was dyed a matching black and her pale blue eyes were ringed with black makeup. Her blood-red lips were like a wound. Alex found the effect more frightening than erotic.
Thomas was a full head shorter than his Mistress, with thinning sandy blond hair and a receding chin. He was wearing only a white jock strap and white tennis shoes. They were probably in their fifties and Alex noticed they wore matching wedding rings.
“On your knees,” Mistress Jade said imperiously when they were introduced. Thomas at once dropped on all fours. Mistress Jade attached a short dog leash to the black leather collar Alex now noticed around his neck and gave it a jerk, pulling him nearly over as she strode from the foyer into the living room.
“Liam, darling,” she purred, wrapping Liam in a bear hug. She stepped back and surveyed Daniel and Alex with a cocked eyebrow. “You’ve added a
girl
to your stable? How quaint. Is she any good?”
“She’s still being trained. She has potential.”
Mistress Jade turned toward Alex. “Kneel and lick my boot. If you’re very, very good, I’ll let you lick my cunt later.”
Instinctively Alex shrank back against Daniel, who gave her a small shove forward. “Do it,” he murmured beneath his breath.
When Alex had been told to obey every Dom at the party, she hadn’t taken women into account. She’d just assumed the Doms would be male. While she wasn’t especially thrilled at the idea of licking this woman’s boot, she was horrified at the thought of being forced to lick her pussy.
Trying not to dwell on that possibility Alex knelt as gracefully as she could and tentatively touched the dusty black leather with her tongue. “Make it shine, girl.” Mistress Jade pushed the toe of the boot into Alex’s mouth. She wanted to recoil but didn’t dare.
The bell rang and she heard the door open. In a booming voice a man announced, “The party can now begin. We have arrived.” This was followed by laughter.
The boot, mercifully, was pulled away as Mistress Jade turned to cry, “Mark, beautiful man. It’s been ages.”
Alex sat back, relieved at her reprieve. Daniel tapped her shoulder and she stood. He put a comforting arm around her and kissed the top of her head. She leaned against him. “She can be a bully. Don’t worry though, she doesn’t like girls except to humiliate them.” Alex found this small comfort and determined to stay off Mistress Jade’s radar for the rest of the evening.
The new couple was considerably more attractive. They were introduced as Mark and Jarrett. In their late twenties or early thirties, they both had hard, lean bodies, though neither was as good-looking as Liam and Daniel. Mark was wearing a black jacket over a black knit shirt and dark trousers. His sub Jarrett wore white cotton pants and a white tank top he removed upon entry to reveal thick silver barbells dangling from his pierced nipples.
As the guests entered they were offered champagne by two dark, handsome Latino men dressed in gold silk lounge pants and matching gold vests, the uniform of the caterers. Two other men in gold moved through the growing crowd, offering platters of hot and cold appetizers.
Liam and Daniel were busy mingling and introducing people to each other, though most of them seemed already acquainted. Alex stayed close to one or the other of them, feeling shy. They introduced her as well, referring to her as their slave girl, which gave her an excited tingly feeling.
Liam was engaged in a conversation with a striking older man with a thick mane of silver hair. A petite woman, naked except for a very thick metal collar around her slender throat, knelt at his feet, her hands chained loosely behind her back. Alex noticed the crisscross of fading and fresh purple welts covering her back and ass.
While Liam and Daniel had marked Alex during whippings, the marks never lasted more than a few hours at most. She noticed the bruising on the woman’s thighs and upper arms and felt a sense of disquiet.
She looked around for Daniel, who was talking to a couple of very good-looking guys. In fact the party was for most part populated with extremely handsome and no doubt very gay men, both Dom and sub. She moved toward him and waited nearby, hoping to catch his eye.
Eventually he saw her and excused himself from his guests. “Hey, Alex. What’s up? You need me?”
She pointed with her chin toward the kneeling woman. “That sub. She’s covered in welts and bruises. Is she okay? She looks like she’s being abused.”
Daniel looked at the woman in question and turned back to Alex. “That’s Isabelle and Christian, her Master. She’s a pain slut. She’s there at his feet because that’s where she wants to be. Don’t worry, she’d not being abused, Alex. We wouldn’t invite people to our house who didn’t honor the basic rules of consensual submission.
“Isabelle and Christian are married. They’ve been living as Master and slave 24/7 since the last of their kids moved out like ten years ago. From what I can see they’re in love and deeply committed to each other.”
“But those bruises. That’s dangerous.”
“No. She’s fine. She has very fair skin and bruises easily, like you do. I’ve left a bruise or two on your ass, you know.” He patted her bottom.
“Yeah but not like that.”
“It’s a matter of degree. Her level of pain tolerance is much higher than yours or mine for that matter. She needs more to feel the intensity we can get from a simple whipping or spanking. They’ll probably do a demonstration later, once the party in is full swing. He always has some new toy he likes to try out on her. But don’t worry, she’s very into it. She’s the one who buys the stuff and begs him to use it on her.”
Alex nodded. It made sense. It was all part of a pleasure/pain spectrum and Isabelle just happened to be at the far end while Alex was more in the middle. If she thought about it, most vanilla folks would be horrified to know what turned her on especially if they didn’t understand the masochistic and submissive mindset and hardwiring.
Hell, her best friend Cheryl, while theoretically aware Alex liked an erotic spanking, would freak out if she knew Alex could nearly orgasm from a good whipping. She would be scandalized to learn Alex could be reduced to soaking-wet desire when the stinging cut of a cane transmuted to pure unfiltered lust.
The doorbell rang at the same time someone across the room was calling loudly to Daniel. He turned to Alex. “Could you get that?” He moved away from her toward the calling voice.
Alex moved through the crowd toward the front door. She wished she was wearing more, which was silly in the circumstances, with half the room in various states of undress. She pulled open the door and looked up at a man of medium height with large black eyes beneath thick, curling hair. He had several days’ growth of beard on his face and a long, slightly hooked nose over a lush, sensuous mouth and strong jaw.
He was wearing a black cashmere jacket over a pearl gray button-down shirt, a hint of chest hair revealed at his throat, around which a slim gold chain glinted. There was something powerful in his face, almost cruel.
He was alone, and for some odd reason Alex found herself desperately hoping he was straight. She at once censored the thought. What did it matter to her? She was taken—she was owned.
He cocked his head at her and bestowed the most beautiful smile she had even seen on a man. His eyes seemed to remove what little clothing she wore as he raked her body with them. “Hello, lovely woman. Are you going to stand there staring at me all night, or are you going to invite me in?”
Flustered, Alex stepped back. He had a slight accent, something Spanish and thoroughly charming. “My name is Anthony. I’m a friend of Matthew and Phillip. I was supposed to come with them but I was detained. And you are…?”
“Alex.” A friend of Matthew and Phillip. Damn, he was gay.
He raised an eyebrow. “Alex is not a suitable name for a woman. What is your given name?”
Alex realized her mouth was dry and tried to swallow. “Alexandra.”
“Beautiful. And much more fitting. May I call you that?”
Alex was confused. The vibe she was getting definitely wasn’t gay. “Yes,” she whispered.
Liam was suddenly beside them. At the same moment two men appeared, the Dom with skin the color of melted chocolate, his sub a complement of vanilla icing. The Dom wore black leather pants and a vest with no shirt beneath. His partner wore white shorts and had muscles that bulged almost to the point of deformity. Even more arresting was the fact his torso, front and back, was covered with brightly colored tattoos.
“Anthony, you made it.” The Dom turned to Liam. “This is the guy I was telling you about. He’s a whip maker from Spain. Anthony Campos.”