Master Me (31 page)

He patted her face and stood. “The instructions in the letter are to help get you in the right frame of mind while I’m away. I’m not spying on you and I’m not a mind reader. If you skip anything or cheat, I daresay I won’t know—but you will and if you’re serious about our relationship, you’ll do your best. Now, please get dressed. I’d like you to wave goodbye to me and it’s a little chilly to do it naked.”

“You can’t just throw something like this at me then disappear for the week,” Helen said, annoyed that her voice was shaking and that she wasn’t going to get the after-spanking pampering she loved. “For God’s sake, Connor!”

He had the grace to look a little sheepish. “I know the timing isn’t ideal, and I promise that when we can talk, you’ll have my undivided attention, but right now, well…”

“You have to bugger off to the States,” Helen said coldly, crossing her arms to cover her breasts. Connor kept her undressed so much that she’d become used to it, but now she was intensely conscious of the fact that she was naked, with a red arse and swollen nipples. Humiliated, in fact, and not in a good way, with her debasement adding a spice to the scene, just simply embarrassed. All this time, she’d thought that she was doing so well…

“Right. I’m useless. Got it. Fine.”

Connor sighed. “You’re nothing of the sort. You know what, you’re right. This was a crap idea and it’s unforgivable of me to voice my concerns then leave. Look, just tear up the letter, enjoy yourself while I’m away, and I’ll be back before you know it.” He gave her a tentative smile. “Is there anything you’d like me to bring back from San Francisco? I won’t have much time to sightsee, but there should be some shops near to my hotel.”

“I hear they have a bridge,” Helen said, stalking past him to the door. “Bring me that, so I can use it to get over this.”

As exit lines went, it needed work, but then, what could he expect from an inarticulate failure as a sub?

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Curiosity and a still-simmering fury had Helen reading the letter before the car whisking Connor to Heathrow, some thirty miles away, had cleared the village green. It was a long letter, navy ink covering page after page, but a quick glance told her that it was more of what Connor had been saying about submitting. Ignoring it for the moment, Helen skimmed through the typed instructions attached instead muttering, “un-fucking-believable,” and, “is he kidding me?” under her breath—but still very much aware that fury wasn’t the only emotion she was feeling. Connor had worked her up and left her wanting and though that could be erotic when he was watching her suffer and squirm, feeling that way without an audience was less enjoyable. There was something about the neat list of duties and expectations that was arousing her though, and eventually, with a sigh, she put the letter back on Connor’s desk to read properly later, rather than tearing it to confetti, as she’d planned.

Late March meant that the days were lengthening and outside on the long lawn leading down to the river, daffodils were making splashes of yellow against the grass. Chilly, yes, but spring had arrived after a long winter and Helen couldn’t help remembering how bleak last spring had seemed. Connor had changed her life in a way no boyfriend ever had. She’d left her tiny London flat and moved to a village in Surrey for one thing. That had meant a journey of less than an hour in a car, but she still felt sometimes as out of place as if she’d emigrated.

Connor’s house had belonged to his great aunt, who’d left it to him for saving her dog from drowning when Connor was ten. Helen wasn’t entirely sure that Connor’s account of the rescue was reliable. He’d downplayed it so that it sounded as if he’d waded into a puddle, not the river in full spate, but she knew that he’d broken his arm during the retrieval of Buster, whose collar had been caught on the branches of a tree limb wedged into some rocks in the centre of the river.

Helen was a cat person, but she could still appreciate what Connor had done, though she felt that there had to have been more to it than that. Maybe Great Aunt Kitty had just liked Connor best out of his generation. Beaconside House wasn’t a mansion, but it was a large early Victorian house, solidly built and with a placidly welcoming atmosphere that Helen had noticed the first time she’d visited. The garden had been created by carving a slice through a bluebell wood, right down to the river, but without a team of gardeners to keep the wood at bay, the lower part of the lawn was gradually succumbing to the patient trees. Helen loved the terrace, overlooking a fragrant bed of roses and lavender, and the twisting paths leading to unexpected benches. Her favourite place to sit with a cup of tea and a book, was a small pond, water lilies floating on its surface, that Connor had told her would be noisy with frogs soon.

Helen stared out of the study window at a dense clump of rhododendron bushes that really needed cutting back, though they’d soon be covered in huge, lushly pink flowers, which would probably save them, and wondered just what exactly Connor was talking about.

The sex was incredible and frequent. Definitely not a problem there. The kinkier side of things…well, from where she’d been kneeling, or lying, hands cuffed tightly, that had seemed to be fine, too. Frowning, bewildered resentment fading to hurt, she made herself a cheese and tomato sandwich and ate it at the kitchen table, a vast, scrubbed white in places, expanse of oak that was so big she had to wonder if they’d built the kitchen around it. Or built it
in
the kitchen.

After dulling the pain of emotional turmoil with the last slice of chocolate truffle cheesecake in the fridge, a piece big enough for two people, but cutting it in half just seemed like too much trouble, Helen took the letter with her upstairs and put it on the bed. A long, hot soak with bubbles in the deep bath—not original to the house, but infinitely more luxurious than the one it had replaced according to Connor, who could spend over an hour in it reading—would make her feel better.

It might have worked if she hadn’t found fragments of sentences from the letter she’d barely glanced at popping up along with the bubbles.

Your choice to submit was made before you really knew what it would entail.

What did that even
mean
? She might have been inexperienced from a practical point of view, but she’d spent hours online going from site to site, reading stories, or staring, wide-eyed and sometimes shocked, at explicit photographs of people in bondage gear, and acres of whipped flesh and leather. She’d researched this lifestyle without ever expecting it to be part of her life. Every night, she found herself in the darkness, her fingers sliding, rubbing, teasing the slick folds between her legs with a delicate cruelty as she pretended that the hands on her belonged to someone else. The Helen who made those animalistic, pleading sounds, who writhed and arched, wanton, shameless, who climaxed with crude, powerful, imploring words spilling from her lips in a voice she didn’t know—that Helen had been locked away during the day.

Connor had made it possible for Helen to unite fantasy and reality at any time of the day, but part of her was still holding back, she realised as the hot water lapped at her breasts, splotched red from the heat. He was right and she wasn’t submitting. Rules he’d mentioned when she’d moved in had been ignored when they’d seemed like too much trouble, or forgotten, and the punishments she’d received for breaking them had been ones she’d enjoyed. Getting put across Connor’s knee for a spanking was breathlessly exciting, not something to avoid in the future by being good.

She’d thought that Connor had enjoyed punishing her and that her disobedience was part of the game, but if it hadn’t, if he’d really wanted her to do as he said, then…oh, shit, she’d really screwed things up.

Helen lay in the bath, staring up at the ceiling, and tried to imagine being the kind of submissive that Connor would want. It would only work if that was what she wanted, too, but did she? It was a huge change in what she was used to in a relationship. Sex that most people would consider kinky thrilled her to the core, but being constantly aware of the fact that Connor was in control of her and tailoring her own behaviour according to his wishes was another matter entirely.

She emerged from the bath, dripping wet, her skin boiled red, and feeling vaguely sick from too much cheesecake but with a decision made. Connor had introduced her to several friends in the scene but he was closest to a couple, Gary and Belinda, who lived about fifteen miles away. They’d been out of the country during the winter, touring Mexico, but they’d returned a few weeks ago and Helen knew that Belinda would happily answer any questions that she had. And Helen had plenty.

Flopping on the bed, a towel wrapped around her, she reached for the bedside phone, wincing when her bottom throbbed, a reminder that she needed to take more care sitting down. Belinda was in and delighted to hear from her, commiserating with an easy sympathy once she heard about Helen’s solitary state.

“So what do you want to do? Girls’ night out?”

“Subs’ night in?” Helen asked, braced for a refusal. “I really need to talk to someone, Belinda. I thought I was getting the hang of it all, but I’m not, or at least Connor doesn’t think I am, and God, if he decides I’m not worth bothering with, I’ll just—I can’t imagine not being with him and I —”

“Slow
down
,” Belinda said. “God, Helen, take a deep breath or something. I’ll ask Gary if I can come over tomorrow night for a few hours, how’s that?”

“Would you?” Helen said with a grateful sigh. “That would be perfect.”

“And it’s okay with Connor?”

“Connor?” Helen said blankly, glancing over at Connor’s side of the bed automatically.

The whole bed was his, technically. She was supposed to sleep on the floor unless Connor told her otherwise, but that was something else that had never really happened. Oh, one night, yes, early on, wrapped in a thick duvet, a chain running from the bed to a Velcro cuff on her wrist, but she’d taken the cuff off to go to the bathroom and it’d seemed so much easier to slide back into bed beside a warm, sleepy Connor and quiet his enquiring murmur with a blow job. After that, she’d just made sure that she was in bed waiting for him at night and he hadn’t pushed it.

“He doesn’t know. Why, do you think I should ask him? He’s never stopped me having friends over before.”

It was Belinda’s turn to sigh. “They weren’t coming to discuss your relationship with your Dom, though, were they? There’s no way that Gary would give me permission if it was behind Connor’s back.”

“See?” Helen said, aware that she sounded tragic. “I didn’t know that. It’s as if there’re all these etiquette rules and I keep eating peas with my knife or something.”

“Stop being so dramatic,” Belinda advised her, a hint of amusement audible in her voice. “Call Connor, or text him, and let me know what he says, okay?”

“Okay,” Helen said feeling forlorn.

She managed to get Connor at the airport, just minutes before he boarded, which meant that their conversation was brief and, given the way they’d parted, a little awkward.

“Of course, Belinda can come over,” Connor said. “Is that really why you called?”

“Yes!” Helen said, indignant about the suggestion that she was so dependent on him that she’d needed to hear his voice one last bloody time. “She seemed to think I should ask first since we’ll be talking about, you know, things.”

“I beg your pardon?”

“I want her advice,” Helen hissed into the phone. “Sub to sub. If your ears burn, you’ll know why.”

“No,” Connor said. “Not going to happen, I’m sorry.”

Helen took a deep breath. “I won’t tell her anything personal, but Connor, I
need
this. I read your letter—well, sort of—and I just—I need to talk to someone who’s doing things the way you like to see if it’s something
I’d
like. I don’t mean copy her, but she’s just—I’ve seen the way she is with Gary and yes, I get that it’s different to how I am with you. She can help me. Look, I’m
trying
here, okay?”

Coherence was beyond her. She could hear the busy noises of the airport and sense Connor’s need to hang up and get on the plane and it was making her flustered and snappy.

“I’ve got a few minutes,” Connor said after a long silence. “I’ll call Gary. But use your brains when it comes to how much you share, is that clear?”

“It’s my sex life, too,” Helen said. “Trust me, I’ll be discreet.”

“You’d better,” Connor muttered and hung up after a terse, “bye.”

Helen exhaled, feeling that she’d taken a step forward. Not necessarily a good thing if she were standing on a cliff edge, but it beat spinning around in panicked circles.

Thirty minutes into Belinda’s visit, Helen was beginning to doubt the wisdom of her idea. Belinda was staring at her with puzzled blue eyes, her riot of tightly curled brown hair quivering as she shook her head in a wordless comment on Helen’s diatribe.

“I don’t get it,” Belinda said when Helen stopped talking, having realised that she was repeating herself and getting worked up to the point of sounding hysterical. “Do you want to be Connor’s sub or not?”

Helen blinked at her in silence, taken aback by the bluntness of the question, then rallied. “I
am
his sub.”

“Not from where I’m standing,” Belinda said with devastating frankness. “You’re playing at it when it suits you, getting your kicks and some rock-your-world orgasms, then going back to being a live-in girlfriend most of the time. It’s obviously enough for you, but I’ve known Connor for years and I can’t see it being enough for him.” She leant back into her corner of the couch and took a slow sip of her herbal tea. “And from what you’re saying, it looks as if it isn’t.”

It would’ve been so easy to have given into the urge to defend herself but Helen knew how that would end, with a heated argument, one of Connor’s oldest friends alienated and a burgeoning friendship with someone she genuinely liked—most of the time—lost for good.

“I know it isn’t,” Helen said. “I just—this isn’t all my fault, you know. Some of the stuff I wanted to do he said was too extreme and I shouldn’t treat erotica as a textbook, so I sort of assumed most of what I’d read wasn’t, well, practical. I’m new to this and I went along with what he said, and if he didn’t like what I was doing, why did he let me keep on doing it for months then tell me minutes—
minutes
—before he left that it wasn’t good enough?” She took a gulp of white wine, swallowed too soon and choked, her eyes watering. “Fuck.”