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She’d made herself a promise that she’d stop getting these obsessions. They were too painful, and embarrassing. But she kept coming back to this one. To him.

He scared her like walking the narrow ledge collaring a tall building. That thrilling fear of being so close to the line between the known and unknown.

She wanted to walk that path all the way around, see the view from every angle. Then, letting go of fear with two open hands, she’d stand at one corner, position her toes over the edge. She’d raise her arms above her head, and tip her face up to the wind and moonlight. Totally trusting, she’d feel joy when he laid his palm in the center of her back, giving her the heat of his touch before he gently pushed her into space.

He’d do it, knowing she could fly.

At that moment she would finally know what life was supposed to be, not simply long for the frustratingly nebulous sense of it. She was sure it was there, just past a boundary she needed to step across. The point of no return.

She'd stepped across a lot of lines, looking for it. While that worried people who cared about her, it wasn’t the jump she sought, but what lay beyond it. She didn’t know how to explain that.

Any more than she knew how to explain her feelings about Wolf, since the sum total of their meaningful interactions amounted to less than the time it took to tell a child a favorite bedtime story.

She grimaced. If she was at home in her bed, she might argue the whole “time is a relative construct” thing with herself, but fortunately she was at Club Atlantis. Too much good stuff was happening tonight. Time to lock the obsessive part of her mind in a closet and focus on the here and now.

“When the Lights Go Out” by Five was pummeling the air, giving it a heated edge and sparkle, for those with the eyes to see it. It was just before midnight, the best time to wander through the club. People were settling into their scenes, and those who couldn’t lock into anything had left, so that swirling, heavy energy could permeate every corner of the club without disruption.

Entering the club from the outside world at this time of night was like stepping into a fairy circle. Dancing until her heart was exploding, but not wanting to stop. Even if, when the night ended, she found a hundred years had passed, everything she once knew as her life left behind.

That would be okay, because the people she loved best in the whole world were here, in the place where she felt most at home.

Ella let the music take hold of her, twisting and rolling her body, dropping her head back so her long hair brushed her backside. The blood red waist cincher she wore tightened its hold.  The white gauze shirt beneath the laced garment had a scoop neck and flowing sleeves, looking like something a pirate woman would wear. The thin fabric revealed and caressed the soft smudge of her nipples, and strained over her full breasts.

Her staff sub service collar and a pair of black latex shorts completed the look, the points of the shirt loose and fluttering over her hips and backside. A temporary ink tattoo of a flight of birds crossed her sternum, a few fluttering up the side of her throat.

As she danced, she threaded her way through the groups of people milling in the social areas, sometimes rubbing up against the ones she knew. She was rewarded with smiles, an affectionate touch in return.

Mistress Chantal was leaning against the divider between two booths, twirling a gleaming red carbon cane deftly over her scarlet painted fingernails. She wore a black form-fitting dress printed with a gold and red dragon. The whiskered creature wound its way over her breasts, waist and hips, enhancing those curves and making her even more enthralling than usual. Her hair was swept up and held with gold pins tipped with scarlet porcelain flowers. The look accentuated her delicate features and sharp eyes.

Chantal was a pure psychological Domme. Ella had seen physically powerful men stay at her feet in whatever position she demanded, no restraints necessary, for impossibly long stretches of time. Cocks stiff with agonizing levels of need, bulging muscles straining, but heads bowed. As if they’d wait for her command until hell froze over. When she finally let them come, the experience was so overwhelming that some of them blacked out.

It was hugely arousing to watch, but Ella’s favorite part was the aftermath. Chantal might kneel, cradle the male in her arms, his head against her breast and her arm around his wide, rounded shoulders. She’d ground him with sips of water and soothing words, as gentle then as she’d been ruthless before.

The dress looked fabulous with her glossy black knee-high boots. When Ella reached her, the Mistress looped her toned arm around Ella’s waist, the two of them moving into a playful bump and grind. The music had moved on to the primal drumbeat sounds of Gloria Estefan’s “Don’t Let This Moment End,” the Hex Hector club mix.

Don’t let this moment end…

Ella felt that way every night here. She never wanted the sun to rise. When she worked at Atlantis, morning was her least favorite time of day.

They adjusted the steps of their fluid dance as needed to protect the male Chantal had stretched out on the floor. His arms were out to his sides, his chin lifted and body frozen. Since he wore belted jeans and nothing else, a woman could appreciate the broad shoulders, the cut abs, the arousal straining against denim. He had a beard and a mane of coarse dark hair, a few strands scattered over the gleaming hair on his broad chest.

He had an intimate view of the two women dancing over him, because Chantal hadn’t commanded him to close his eyes. Ella noticed his avid blue-gray gaze tracked the Mistress like a tiger ready to hunt for his dinner.

As the music segued into “Dancing Machine” by the Jackson 5, Chantal laughed, her white teeth flashing. On the horn section, she and Ella raised their arms above their heads and bumped hips, this way, that way, stepping left and right over the male, precise and graceful. As they kept it going, others joined in around them.

Using a flourish of the cane, Chantal moved everyone back, cutting a wider swathe around her captive. With a provocative serpent-like roll of her upper body to her hips, she spun down to a seated position on her submissive’s chest.

She arched, rubbing her ass in slow circles against that furred terrain. Ella watched his eyes course up her body, following the upward tilt of her breasts. Chantal reversed direction, curving forward to press a kiss to his forehead. Her command for stillness meant he couldn’t reach for anything, with mouth or hands. His lips parted as if he had muttered a curse, while hers curved against his flesh in response.

The Mistress stood again, one foot planted by his elbow, the other heeled boot propped on his chest. She reached under the stretched fabric of her dress, bringing a pair of black lace panties into view. With admirable balance, she worked them off, shifting her stance, then draped them over the edge of the carbon cane.

“Open your mouth,” she said, gesturing to her own since she didn’t care to shout over the noise. He read the command, his lips parting.

She brought the panties down, dropping them on the lower half of his face. His chest expanded as he inhaled deep. Chantal’s eyes glowed at his response. Using the tip of the cane, she pushed the panties into his open mouth, balling them up.

Ella had seen her do the same maneuver with a violet wand, something Chantal would never activate while it was near a sub’s mouth, but the suggested threat had added to the sub’s experience for that night’s scene. As the cane did for this male.

Chantal had one boot sole pressed against his sizeable erection. As she rocked toe to heel and back, applying a quelling pressure, she touched his arms with her cane. “My legs,” she said, loudly enough to be heard by him this time. “No higher than my knees.”

His large hands left the floor. Ella gave him credit for not grabbing Chantal like a sailor seizing a mermaid. He molded his palms over her calves, just above her ankles, slowly, each finger pressing into the thin layer of boot so she would feel the strength in his hands.

Chantal’s eyes glittered, her lips parting. An expression that said Nicely done. This man was focused on giving her as much pleasure as she was giving him.

The spontaneous scene space the Mistress had created had drawn a watching crowd. Ella didn’t think he was aware of that, even if his subconscious was feeding on the wave of voyeuristic energy.

When Chantal glanced at Ella, Ella fanned herself and did a little “go girl” spin with fist pump that had Chantal’s lips curving. Then Ella leaned close enough to speak in her ear.

“You didn’t tell me you’d caught Aquaman.”

Chantal shot her a wicked look. Lifting her arm to comb her fingers through Ella’s thick locks, she wrapped the strands up in her fist and gave them a firm tug. “Looks a lot like him, doesn’t he? There’s no fish I can’t hook, little one. You know that.”

After a few more pleasant moments, Ella left her to it, moving onward. Next stop was the largest public play area in the club. She stopped in the wide archway, hugging the right side to stay out of the flow of foot traffic.

Point Blank’s rock and roll "Great White Line" had started up.  Never going home… Ella’s attention landed on the guest DJ, surrounded by sound equipment, stationed on a raised platform. He was an unassuming-looking guy, with curly brown hair, golden-brown eyes, and a shy smile. The song had Ella imagining the scene from Pink Floyd's The Wall, where the fan girls overran band security. The age of metal bands and their groupies. Latex and body glitter, long hair and hungry eyes.

She should propose a Rock Star night to Anwyn, Club Atlantis’s owner, and see how that played out in their world. While she expected most of the Doms would go the rock star route and the subs would take a groupie or roadie role, she could imagine some who would flip it. A rock star who wanted to be under the command of a devoted Dominant fan. Or maybe a Dom roadie who wanted to exact some punishment for his rock star boss being too much of a diva.

She grinned. Anwyn called Ella her official Minion of Play. Gideon, who belonged to Anwyn and was part of the club’s executive management staff, had nicknamed Ella “Julie,” after The Love Boat cruise director. Ella wore both names with pride.

The first time she’d approached Anwyn with her ideas, she’d been so nervous. But Madelyn and Chantal, both Mistresses on staff, had encouraged her to do it. They’d told her to pitch it to Anwyn the same way she’d pitched it to them, spoken straight out of her well of love for the club.

“New members or guests might want to play, but at first they’re not sure. They want to watch, get into the flow gradually. We also have a lot of people who come just to watch, because that’s all they need or can do. We’re already doing demos, which are great, but theme nights would show the application in a fun, interactive way. Then the more self-conscious people start to feel comfortable.”

"Like getting people out on the dance floor, so the more bashful ones can join in," Anwyn had said.

"Exactly. And the bigger the voyeur crowd, the more energy it gives the public scenes.”

Bringing in guest DJs had been another of Ella’s ideas. She visited the clubs and raves where the DJs showed their stuff, listened to what they put together, and brought her recommendations back to Anwyn for vetting.

So far, tonight’s DJ was putting together some unusual and ambiance-creating pieces, perfect for the mood of the club. That was part of the fun of having the DJ; seeing how the moods he evoked altered whatever might happen, spontaneously or planned.

If he wasn’t totally freaked out by what he was seeing inside the exclusive Club Atlantis, he’d hopefully become a regular. Since he was laughing in a relaxed kind of way at something a couple dressed in nothing but cuffs and chains were calling up to him, the signs were encouraging.

He was back to Gloria Estefan, the hot fast Latin rhythm of Oye, a duet with Pablo Cortez. Ella glanced back to see even more people crowding onto the dance floor, a mix of writhing bodies, glinting metal and rippling, colorful fabrics.

Hey boy, I see you looking, I know you're watching…

But you won't make that move.

The line fit Chantal and her Aquaman. Except for the “boy” thing. That sub was a hundred percent knee-weakening grown man, head to toe. She bet Chantal had moved him to a private room, the preliminaries over. The overflow area around the dance floor perimeter was getting too crowded to safely keep him there.

While the DJ was piling them onto the dance floor, he was also boosting the vibe in the public play space. Ella had seen every emotion happen here. Tears, laughter, revelations, from small epiphanies to life-changing ones. Sometimes a total breakdown of who someone thought they were. Or a new foundation laid for someone they’d never thought they could be. People could fall in love here or in lust, only for the moment or forever.

Usually when she wandered through this section, she would take her time, absorbing all those different possibilities. But now that she was here, her steps quickened, taking her toward the session happening in the back corner.

If she was being honest with herself, it had been her destination all along. Though when it came to Wolf, she didn’t always believe in being honest. Comforting lies kept her from making a fool of herself.

Most of her intense crushes landed on people out of her reach. In this case, that was the world’s biggest understatement. Compared to those earlier obsessions, Wolf was another solar system.

Yet here she was.

People had sunk to the floor around him in a semi-circle, just outside the marked boundary of the session space. The marking was something the staff Doms had suggested a while ago. Now the more popular scenes didn’t result in lookers-on pressing too close, disrupting the connection between the top and bottom, or causing safety issues if the Dom was throwing a whip or doing anything that needed more elbow room. This corner was also set up with an elevated dais, which helped reinforce that barrier.

She eased herself into a small opening close to the wall. He had a naked female submissive restrained on a black wooden frame. The silver of the chains clipped to her cuffs gleamed like her perspiring henna-colored skin.

She was in her forties, and her stretch marks said she’d had children. She was wide-hipped, with a large, heart-shaped backside and full breasts. Selena and Mario were tattooed on one shoulder, surrounded by a spray of flowers. Her children, Ella deduced. Her long dark hair had been bound up in a strap and pinned to the cross, holding it out of the way and increasing her immobility.

It was rare to see Wolf with a woman. Initially, Ella had thought men were his dedicated preference. However, the first time she’d seen him do a public scene with a female, his absorption and sexual interest had been no less intense, but there’d been a different tone to the pause and transition moments. Softer.

The woman then had been blindfolded. Once or twice he’d paced away, taken a seat to stare at her as he sipped from a bottle of water. Something about the straight set of his body, a tension in his shoulders, had made Ella wonder if women were more difficult for him, more emotionally draining.

In addition to regular sessions like this, he did BDSM therapy. Not just for their members, but for guests from other clubs, since his reputation had gotten around. Those sessions were always private room scenes.

She would have dearly loved to watch one, and not merely because of the professional interest. He was so contained on the public floor, yet there was an energy behind his gaze that hinted of a storm of limitless magnitude. The kind that came with thunder and lightning which split the heavens, and brought torrential rains. Rains that could put out the fires that roared through the heart, leaving loss and never-ending pain in their wake. Was she being fanciful, or could he really do that for others? Would she want him to do it for her?

She’d only have to ask. She could book his time like anyone else, and receive a hefty employee discount.

Yet she didn’t ask. It wasn’t what that obsessive side of her wanted, and she was smart enough to contain it, mostly. Taking only a bite didn't do anything but increase the craving for something she likely couldn't have.

In a futile attempt to prove she had some self-control, she’d made herself look at the female sub first. When she did glance his way, she forced herself to do a slow drift, rather than snapping her gaze to him like a rubber band fired from a pointed finger. Her reward was absorbing his impact in a gradual way, a slow fill of her lower extremities with the sweetness of building desire.

No offense to the entity who had created him, but whoever had released Wolf to walk among mortals had been freaking insane to let him go.

Six foot five. Skin like charred bronze. Eyes like silver lightning. A stern mouth that went with the prominent sloped cheekbones and set jaw. His shoulders were broad. Tonight, Wolf wore metallic coated black denim jeans over laced boots, no shirt, exposing a lot of gleaming brown muscle. He was a giant, a sharply sculpted one, every muscle, bone and shape of him chiseled. One part ancient warrior king, one part sensual demon lord, comprised of black smoke and fire.

She’d looked at prime male specimens before, but Club Atlantis attracted all body types. Different ages and sizes engaged in the artful give and take of Domination and submission. When done right, it erased physical boundaries and took them into far more spiritual and emotional ones. That was why she knew it wasn’t merely his physical side that held her attention the way he did.

When she gazed at him, she saw the endless darkness surrounding that building ledge, far up in the clouds. She couldn’t see what was in it, but it was waiting. Pulling at her to leap. When he pushed her, he would be pushing her into the abyss of himself.

Time to get a grip. No matter how strong the pull she felt toward him, they had a nonexistent relationship, really. He never invited her to do a session with him, though he occasionally accepted Ella’s assistance to help him clean up after a scene, or provide backup aftercare. Whatever his thing was, she wasn’t it. Which hurt, but that was okay. In their world, the only appropriate response to rejection was gracious acceptance. Temper tantrums or cathartic cries were handled alone, in private.

He was aware of everyone, grasping details that made anyone in his sphere feel exceptionally noticed. Which meant his notice of her wasn’t exceptional at all.

But what should be and what was, weren’t always on the same page in her mind. When his gaze flickered in her direction now, marking her, her arms tightened against herself. She had them folded against her upper torso, her fingers wrapped over her hip bones as she leaned against the wall. A protective posture, or perhaps self-restraint, so she didn’t fling herself at his feet.

He turned his attention back to his submissive, putting his hand on the woman. Her spine was curved, every vulnerable vertebra visible. Her backside was stained red, handprints blotched beneath the sharp stripes of a switch.

He could be extreme, or he could handle a newbie. He evaluated what every sub needed and took them to their limits to give them the experience they’d hoped for, with a thrilling, sometimes terrifying, glimpse of even deeper possibilities. A reevaluation of those limits, or a reinforcement of why they were there.

The woman let out a cry as he dug his fingers into the switch marks. He pushed his knee between her legs, rubbed, a move that made his body flex from back to hip and buttock. “You going to come for me?”

“It hurts,” she gasped. “So much…”

“Yeah, it does. You’re still going to come for me. Pain doesn’t exceed obedience. Does it?” He had a deep voice with a rasping edge. Another erotic rough texture to tease the senses.

She shook her head, but she was shaking, tears running down her face. “Lift your left foot,” he said. As he slid his other arm around her waist, holding her securely, he kept moving her against his knee. The coated jeans would provide friction to aroused tissues.

She raised her foot, trembling. He’d changed out the switch for a riding crop and teased the looped end across her sole. He rolled it in his hand, flick, flick, trail. Flick.

Slap!

The sting of the blow wrenched a cry from her throat and had the crowd flinching, even as they remained wide-eyed, leaning forward.

“Work yourself against me as I tickle your feet, mamacita,” he crooned.

She shuddered, but twitched her hips on him. He moved the hand on her waist up to cup her breast, enjoy a squeezing massage of the curve. His grip showed flesh like rising bread dough between his fingers, and he tugged her nipple between his knuckles. He continued to move his leg back and forth, manipulating her on it as that crop kept falling, as he kept fondling her breasts. His coordination and rhythm were almost inhuman.

With every strike, her cries kept rising, short, clipped wails, pleas. “Please…no more…no más…” Then the words gave way to screams of pleasure, as the orgasm overtook the pain, his will demanding compliance from hers.

Ella was quivering, using the embrace of her wrapped arms and tight fingers to stay together and not shatter with the woman. Rapt attention held the crowd around Wolf and the sub, the Doms projecting an additional level of critical attention, learning from his technique.

Ella glimpsed one or two people who looked a little uncertain, newbies unsure about the sub’s pleas for no more. Ella knew the woman could safeword and end the scene whenever she wished, but even if she didn’t, Wolf was closely monitoring her. If he thought she was too lost in subspace to protect herself, he would act upon that even faster than she could safeword. But Ella made a note to search out those couple of folks after this was over and talk it out with them, be sure they understood. Every staff member was trained to help with education and awareness, and look for the cues of members and guests who needed it.

See? She could stay professional and tuned into her job, even if ninety percent of the rest of her was engrossed by the scene happening before her—or rather, the Master orchestrating it.

Wolf’s stern mouth had curved as the woman lost herself to the orgasm. He took her all the way down that slide, until she was at the bottom, slowing down, hips jerking, body shuddering. Now she was talking again, mumbling. “Thank you, Dios, thank you…”

She was panting, her hands fisted around the chains, the fine hairs on her nape soaked.

Ella slipped across the session boundary. He hadn’t asked for her help, but the staff stayed alert to when a Dom needed more hands, particularly at the end of a strenuous session.

She knelt, reaching out and accepting the crop Wolf handed her without looking, as if he’d expected her to be there. “Water,” he said.

She rose to put the crop in the open bag of tools he had left a few feet away. Then she withdrew a bottle of water from a small fridge concealed by a curtain.

He’d released the woman’s hands, and eased her down to the floor, her legs too weak to hold her. Wolf dropped to one knee and braced her against it as he chafed her wrists. When Ella handed him the water, he fed it to the sub himself, one hand holding the bottle, the other cupping her face. His attention was on her and her alone. It was painful and glorious to watch. Glorious because that absolute attention was a drug to any submissive. Painful because Ella craved it like air.

“Small sips,” Wolf told the woman. She nodded dazedly, her hands cupping his around the bottle. Then, without looking at her, he said, “Thank you, Ella. Stay here.”

He didn’t say why, but a Dom didn’t need to do so. She’d knelt when he’d squatted, because she’d had two options—move back to a respectful distance, or assume a position where she wasn’t standing over him, but could still remain close.

No brainer there.

She gazed at his wide back, the long valley of his spine that led to the rise of his taut buttocks covered by the jeans. The back center loop of the jeans stretched against his belt, and she could see the twin depressions marking his pelvic bones. Her eyes returned to the dip of his shaved head as he bent attentively over his charge. The dark bronze skin gleamed under the club lighting. He had no visible tattoos, which was strange for anyone these days, especially in their world. She’d never seen him fully naked, though when he was aroused, there was no doubt he was mouthwateringly equipped.

She imagined trailing her fingers along the curve of his smooth skull, down to his nape, following the track of his spine. Resting her fingers on his waistband, she’d hook them there to hold onto him as she knelt. She thought of putting her mouth all the places she imagined her fingers touching. What would he taste like? She knew his scent, a mix of spice and damp rain in the forest.

Wolf rose, lifting the woman as if she weighed nothing. He navigated the two steps of the dais with a sure stride, but he moved slowly, head bent over his charge, still talking to her. It gave the clustered people time to ease out of the way.

Kevin was already sitting on a couch close by, waiting on him. The alpha submissive handled most of Wolf’s aftercare for him. A fireman in his daily life, he projected the steady confidence that made him excel at both roles. He had red hair and freckles, and rich brown eyes that transformed ordinary features into exceptionally appealing ones.

Many staff Doms chose to delegate aftercare to a trusted sub or fellow Dom. If someone paying for a session confused the emotional intensity of a D/s scene with an invitation for a continued relationship, the incredible intimacy of aftercare could exacerbate that misunderstanding. Handing it over to someone else was a firm demarcation line and grounding step, helping the sub to pull her or himself together, and keep things in perspective.

Wolf put her in Kevin’s arms, kissed the woman’s hand, touched her face, and then pivoted, striding back toward the platform. His expression while looking upon the submissive had been stern but caring. When he turned away, Ella saw his expression return to its usual unreadable mien.

Everyone had their story for why they embraced a Dom or sub side, even those for whom it was simply a natural evolution of their sexual interests. But he had never revealed his motivations or how he’d reached this level of expertise. That he enjoyed his sessions, she had no doubt. But she’d not yet figured out the more complicated layers to it, except for her belief that men were easier for him.

After he’d left the platform, Ella had stood up and moved to the rack holding sanitary cloths, so she was wiping down the play area, getting it ready for whoever used it next. She expected clean-up help was why he’d asked her to remain. He withdrew another bottle of water from the fridge and took a swallow, watching her as he did so.

The audience viewing the session was dispersing. Sometimes he was approached afterwards with questions, but since he kept his attention fixed on Ella, he projected an unmistakable “not right now” vibe that the inquisitive respected.

He remained silent, though. Her skin was tingling under his intent regard. When she finished and disposed of the wipes, he nodded. 

“Follow me.”

She was surprised when he took her hand, guiding her down the two steps off the dais. But she wasn’t objecting. The few times he’d touched her, she’d noted a suppressed power to his grip. His fingers were warm and the right kind of smooth and strong.

Regrettably, he released her after the functional touch and proceeded, her trailing him, until he reached a quiet corner with an unoccupied deep easy chair. He took a seat in it, but sat on the edge, and pointed between his spread knees. It meant he was curved over her as she sank down between his feet. A tremor ran through her as she wondered what this was. She kept her gaze on the floor, though she had the pleasure of it traveling over some tempting terrain before it landed there.

“I want to see your face.”

He wasn't typically much for caressing or casual gestures of intimacy. Most of his gestures were very purposed, like now, where he deliberately placed his hand against her face, his forefinger against her cheek bone, his thumb pressed beneath her chin so she had to lift it.

“What were you thinking when you were kneeling behind me, Ella?”

Well, shit. It was far easier for her to lie to herself than to a Dom. No way could she hold back while a Master like Wolf was staring right into her face.

“Don't think of lying to me," he said in a casual, not-at-all-casual voice.

And definitely not when he did that.

She complied, but kept her gaze on the wall just beyond his right ear. He hadn’t told her to look him in the eye. In her peripheral vision, she was aware of him studying her so intently, it was like a touch on her face. She had to remind herself of the question.

“I was thinking I'd like to be her," she said. "And I was thinking of touching you."

"Touching me how?"

"Touching your spine." She reached behind herself to run her finger up the mentioned area on her own body. The trail of her fingers on her lower back below the cincher caused gooseflesh, as if it was his hand touching her instead. She blamed his stare for that transference effect.

It wasn't calculated, but the motion thrust her breasts out. His eyes rested there briefly, enjoyably, then went back to her face.

"And?"

How did he know there was more? He could be guessing, but the best Doms excelled at tormenting a sub this way, pulling way more out of them than they wanted to say. 

"Um. Your head. I was thinking of touching your head, feeling the smoothness." She colored a little over that one. His expression remained unreadable. She fought not to squirm.

"What have you done to earn such a privilege?"

The answer to such a question was "Nothing,” since a few minutes cleaning his scene space hardly qualified for such a gift. However, other things surged forth, wanting her to offer a different answer.  She even boldly looked him in the eye. Well, for a split second. It would have been undetectable by the human eye, but sometimes there were things about Wolf that seemed other than human.

"I could earn it, sir."

He leaned forward until there seemed to be less than a breath between them, though Ella couldn’t test that theory since she’d stopped breathing. Wolf curled his fingers around her wrist.

He tugged on it, so she stood up on her knees and inched closer between his, her breasts brushing his bare chest. The thin fabric did nothing to lessen the jolt of sensation that sparked through her body and arrowed downward.

She had to tip her head back to keep her face in his view, as ordered. Those piercing eyes and unsmiling mouth, his scent and heat, were so close, overwhelming her. It was almost a bittersweet relief when his gaze shifted downward.

His free hand lifted. She strangled on a soft sound as he brushed a curved knuckle over one taut peak.

“These beautiful, beautiful tits,” he said quietly. “Just out there, begging to be touched.”

He fanned his fingers like a bird wing to caress the full mound of one. Then he curled those long, strong digits, and two of his knuckles closed over the nipple, a firm clamp like a hawk’s beak. She swallowed, noisily.

He guided her captive hand past his waist, to his back. The heat in the small space between their bodies intensified. “You can touch me as you imagined,” he said, that deep, rough voice tagged with a growl. “As long as you can bear the pain. If you ask me to stop, then you have to stop.”

“Yes, sir.”

He let her wrist go. As soon as she started to slide her liberated hand toward his spine, his knuckles began to tighten.

She knew how to take a lot of discomfort, but an enticement like this made it harder to focus on pain management. She thought of how he’d brought a woman to climax while beating the soles of her feet. It wasn’t the first time he’d demonstrated his mastery at bringing a sub right to the threshold where pain and pleasure had to go their separate ways. When he did that, she saw the sadist in him. One who would push a sub past that threshold, feeding on how much she would be willing to take for him.

She wanted to give him that, almost as much as she wanted to touch him. So she was doubly motivated. But hellfire, he was going to make her earn it. The pressure of that clamp continued to grow, the pain lancing through her breast as she reached the center of his back.

Her middle and index fingers settled in the valley of his spine, the other three alighting around it. His skin was warm, with an amazing solidity, the skin merely thin gift wrap over muscle. She started low, just above the tempting dip between his buttocks. The hard bones of his pelvis were briefly under the heel of her hand as she trailed upward.

A gasp escaped her as he added a slow twist to the pincer grip. She’d dampened when he took her hand at the dais, so it was no surprise that she was fully wet between her legs. She was incapable of concealing her strong reaction to honoring a Master’s will, earning his approval, all while enjoying the pleasures he gave her as a reward.

When she reached the base of his neck, he twisted harder. She cried out, and her fingers jerked, but then she dug them into his flesh. Hell, it hurt so much. Her body was contorted in a rigid curve around that central pain point, trying to ease what couldn’t be eased.

“You just have to say stop,” he reminded her in a throaty rumble.

Which meant she’d have to stop touching him. She shook her head, a quick snap, and pressed into his punishing touch so she could slide her fingertips along the slope of his ear, headed to his skull. She tipped her face up, gazing at the strong line of his cheek and jaw, his ear, the movement of her arm. She could feel his total focus on her reactions.

He was tall, even sitting. He slid his other arm around her waist, hand over her hip and buttock to give her the extra lift needed to touch the crown of his head. She had a round ass, but his hand was nearly large enough to span the whole cheek he gripped. He scattered her mind when he tightened that hold, kneading. Supporting her needs while he took what he desired. It was a powerful combination, one that could break open dangerous yearnings in her.

He increased the compression on her nipple. She was beyond true agony, but if she wanted to touch him the way she’d described, this was the price.

How badly do you want it? That question always stood guard between a person and any goal worth having. But there was more to this, and that, as much as her own desires, kept her enduring. What was she doing to him? What pleasure was he receiving from her pain, her willingness to bear it simply for the right to touch him?

She passed her fingertips over his crown. Her hand was shaking, but she fought through the pain rocketing through her to make it a caress, to convey how much she liked the feel of him.

Abruptly, the compression stopped, which yanked a moan of relief from her. She sagged against his shoulder and upper arm before she could catch herself, but he had her. He was still holding her up, letting her touch him. She’d stopped moving her hand, though, anticipating what he might command next.

Instead, he dipped his head down, making her heart beat faster and giving her more access. An unspoken permission to continue.

She breathed out a sigh as she trailed her fingers over his skull. A man who shaved his head had to care for it, to keep it gleaming and smooth like this. She wouldn’t mind helping with that, rubbing in whatever aftershave products he used to keep it pleasurable to the touch.

She imagined how this felt to him, the tiny tracks each of her fingertips were making over his bare skin, a skimming, easy caress. Down to the nape, behind the ear, back up. The head, nape and occipital bone were all erogenous zones. His breath heated the base of her throat, and she realized his head had dropped further.

He closed his hand fully over her breast, massaging her throbbing nipple in the nest of his palm, soothing while he explored the fullness of the curve. Her breath caught again as he put his mouth on the top of her breast.

Now she had both hands on him, one stroking his nape, measuring the width of his shoulders. The other continued to caress and explore his head, the shape of ears, the creases at the base of his skull, then around to the temple and up to that crest again.

He moved his touch up her back, wound his fingers into her hair, and drew her head back farther, way farther. He arched her over his arm as he nuzzled her collar bones, used his tongue to tease her temporary tattoo, all the little birds fluttering up her throat. She could hear the artery pounding harder beneath his mouth and he paused, his fingers tightening on her. When his teeth scraped her, she moaned and he muttered something that reminded her of Aquaman, the way he’d cursed against the demand for self-restraint. But she was the sub. Wolf could do as he liked. She wanted him to do whatever he wished.

After a charged moment, he moved downward, lips playing over the birds on her sternum. Then he placed his mouth fully over her nipple. An even more needy sound escaped her throat as he suckled her through the cloth, rubbed the folds of it wetly against her. She swayed in his hold, her hands dropping to grab his shoulders. They felt wide enough to carry the world.

Most of the things she did at Club Atlantis had a very defined structure. Beginning of session, end of session. Wolf hadn’t set any parameters. Just brought her here, asked her a question, made clear his price for the answer. She didn’t have any context or meaning for what he was doing. She was adrift on a heavy tide of feeling. Her sex was throbbing, making her want to rub herself against him.

He lifted his head, and cupped hers in one hand. She was bent back over his arm, still on her knees but almost parallel to the floor as he leaned over her. He’d left the chair and dropped onto one knee to hold her like this, suckle her nipple. Her hair was brushing the floor while his fingers remained buried in it, his palm supporting her skull.

He looked down at her breasts, straining against the gauzy cloth. “Show me the one I hurt,” he said.

She fumbled her way to her chest, found the loose elastic of the scoop neckline. Lifting it over the nipple and pulling the fabric down, she exposed the breast to him. Her whole body quivered at his look, the silver-touched-with-fire irises getting more iridescent.

“You’ve pleased me, Ella,” he said.

“Thank you, sir.” Her voice was barely a breath.

“There will be bruising around it. If you do a session, you’ll tell the Dom to avoid that area.” He lifted his gaze to her, and if he’d driven a spike through a collar around her throat, locking it permanently, he couldn’t have her attention more completely. “No one touches that nipple but me, until I say so. The rest of you is fine, but that one belongs to my mouth and my hand. You understand?”

She found her voice again, somewhere, somehow. “Yes, sir.”

He lifted her hand from his shoulder and examined it, his fingers spreading hers, his thumb running over her palm. Tingles shot through her arm, to her upper torso, flushing her neck and making her exposed nipple harder.

“Curious,” he murmured. Then he brought her hand back up to his scalp and placed it against the broadest part of his skull. He pressed her palm against the heat of flesh and resilience of bone. His gaze pinned hers. “That’s a place only you have touched, like this, in a very long time.”

He straightened and brought her up out of the arched position, lifting her to her feet as if she weighed nothing, even though he stayed on one knee. Once she was upright, he adjusted the neckline of her shirt. She wasn’t much taller than him, even while he was kneeling.

For a minute, she felt like a girl, her daddy straightening her clothes. The impression was enhanced by the stern way he was looking at her. Because of what he said next, she wondered if he’d intended that.

“I’m doing a workshop on Daddy Dom/little girl play at Friday’s early evening orientation session. I need an assistant. You’ll be there at seven.”

Though it wasn’t the primary form of BDSM expression for either of them, they’d both had plenty of experience with guests and members who did enjoy Daddy Dom play. That was why he was asking for her assistance, she told herself. There was nothing unusual about it.

Except he’d never asked her to assist him before, despite the wealth of expertise she had, in a variety of areas.

Sorting quickly through her complicated schedule, she was relieved to find she could make that work. Saying she couldn’t would have been a far worse pain than what he’d done to her nipple. Now that he’d taken his soothing hand and mouth away, the throbbing was back. But she wondered if the thumping pulse of blood she felt in the abused area had more to do with the awareness he’d planted in her mind than the physical trauma.

No one would touch that part of her but him. It was his, until he said otherwise. What was happening here? This wasn’t a session. What was he doing?

She knew the boundaries and negotiations that went into healthy Dominant and submissive relationships. She could ask for permission to ask questions, request definitions, structure, to whatever this was. She wasn’t weak-minded or desperate, unwilling to ask or say no for fear of rejection. That kind of mindset was born of insecurity, a poor self-image. Anwyn and the other Dominants were quick to detect it when it came through the doors. They either educated the sub to bring them up to speed, or regretfully denied them membership until they could get to a healthier place.

So it wasn’t that which kept her silent. Something about him had always been…more, when it came to the Dom thing. As if his Dominance went beyond a sexual orientation, which was an odd thought, since an orientation was part of a person’s core identity. Regardless, she couldn’t find it in herself to question him now. Instead, she was drifting in a haze of instant recall, remembering the way he’d bent his head to let her touch his neck and head. His skull had been so close to her mouth she could have pressed her lips to his flesh, as she wound her arms around his broad shoulders.

The music had changed radically. The DJ had dialed it down with “Danny Boy,” sung by a female vocalist.

I will sleep in peace until you come to me…

She didn’t know about that, but peace wasn’t always peaceful. Sometimes it rode the current of something overflowing with possibilities, right over a waterfall and down beneath it. The pounding strength could drive her to her knees, keeping her exactly where she wanted to be. In over her head.

“Yes, sir,” she said. “Seven o’clock.” I’ll be there.

She didn’t say that part, because there was no need.  His expression said no other answer was possible.