Killing Me Softly: A Romantic Suspense Anthology, page 212
“Not here,” Aidan says. “Upstairs. Now.”
8
Aidan
When Fiona pulled me aside to tell me she'd seen Grace in the crowd, I didn't want to believe her. After everything the girl has been through, the abuse she endured at her father’s hand, the last thing she needs to see is her guardian flogging a woman for his own, and everyone else’s, amusement.
The instant my gaze locked on Dante's hand around Grace’s throat, my body sprang into action. I pride myself on being patient and controlled in all areas of my life.
But in that moment, a switch flipped.
Dante has been my friend for almost a decade. I’ve even loaned my own subs to him on occasion. And I was ready to break all five of his fingers to remove them from Grace’s neck.
I make her walk ahead of me up the stairs, not taking my eyes off her for an instant. My fellow Doms and I have strict rules about not allowing underaged guests at our play parties. There’s no way I can look at Grace and not see how innocent and untouched she is, but I can also see why my guests might assume she’s here to play. These skin-tight leotards she insists on wearing leave nothing to the imagination. The first time I watched her dance, I had no trouble discerning the exact size and shape of her nipples. Not to mention the shallow cleft between her legs.
If she were my daughter, I’d make her wear a goddamn ski suit whenever she practiced in public. But Grace isn’t my daughter, and she sure as hell isn’t mine. I'm responsible for her wellbeing until she comes of age, but she doesn't belong to me.
This situation has me reeling. My body’s still buzzing from the scene I just walked out of, and my brain hasn’t had time to transition away from Dom mode.
Grace pauses at the top of the stairs, awaiting my further direction with wide, expectant eyes. She’s nervous, and I don’t blame her for feeling that way. The last time a submissive came to the house, Grace was clearly shaken by the sounds she heard. Now she’s witnessed me flogging a sub's back; it only makes sense that she’d be on guard.
I point in the direction of Grace's bedroom and follow her there, pulling the door shut behind me. She spins to face me, holding her own hands.
“You weren’t supposed to be here tonight,” I say.
“My ballet class was canceled. I decided to come back early.”
“You should’ve called first.”
“I don’t have your number. And I did text Jen when I left school, but she didn’t respond.”
“That was an oversight,” I tell her. This afternoon, I explicitly instructed Jen to take the night off, which included a direct order to turn off her work phone.
I take a deep, stabilizing breath, wishing I’d thought to put a shirt on. At the moment, I find Grace’s unblinking gaze unnerving. I can’t shake the feeling that I’ve been turned inside out. Things that were supposed to be kept secret are now on full display.
“I’m sorry you had to witness that,” I tell her.
“I’m not,” she says, so softly I almost miss it. “What you did in the gym. That’s what you and Fiona were doing the night I heard you, isn’t it?”
“Yes.” After everything she’s seen tonight, there’s no point in being anything but frank. “I’m sure you have questions, and I’ll do my best to answer them.”
Something in the way she’s looking at me makes my heart beat faster. I know that look, that raw, naked desire. She wants something she doesn’t think she can have. Something she’s afraid to ask for.
“What if I wanted you to do it to me?”
I blink twice before her words fully register.
“You want me to flog you?” I ask.
“I’ve been reading about BDSM, and watching movies and how-to videos. I know I’m a people pleaser, but I’m starting to think it runs deeper than that. I think I’d like to...serve someone.”
The mental image of Grace bound to a St. Andrew’s Cross flickers across my mind’s eye. If I weren’t still humming like an engine left to idle, I’d have an easier time pushing it away.
“Watching you with the flogger,” she continues. “It did things to me. I think... No, I know I want to serve you.”
Of all the reactions I expected her to have, this isn’t even in the same zip code. Grace watched me flog and cane a woman, and instead of apprehension, she felt...things.
I run a hand down my face, struggling to come to terms with what this ray of sunshine is telling me. She wants to be on her knees, wants to be bound, flogged, and caned.
And she wants me, her guardian, to do it to her.
Every rational bone in my body is railing at me not to encourage her. If a Dominant came to me and said he was thinking about taking on a girl that young, I’d strongly urge him to find someone older. If he refused, I’d throw him out of my dungeon—but not before making it all but impossible for him to put his broken and battered hands on anyone, let alone an underaged girl.
“You’re too young to be practicing BDSM,” I say.
“I’m almost eighteen.”
“Almost eighteen isn’t eighteen,” I tell her. “Even if you were old enough, I would be the wrong person to train you.”
“You’re the perfect person.” She moves toward me. “You’re patient and understanding, and you don’t lose your temper over little things. You seem like you’ve been doing this a long time.”
“Longer than you’ve been alive.”
“See? That's exactly what I mean.” Grace smiles, unmoved by my not-so-subtle reference to our age difference. “I trust you, Aidan. I can’t imagine trusting anyone as much as I trust you, especially now that I know this is what you’re into.”
“How does knowing that I enjoy hurting people make me more trustworthy in your estimation?”
“Because you only hurt people who want to be hurt,” she says.
“And you’re telling me you want me to hurt you?” I study her closely. Her arousal is painted all over her face. In her dilated pupils and the way her lips float apart from each other as she considers her response.
She presses a trembling hand to the center of my chest.
“I want you to do whatever you want to me.”
My internal temperature surges.
Grace doesn’t just want me to flog and cane her, though those acts would be criminal. She wants me to do all of those things, and then fuck her.
The thought rouses a hunger inside me I thought I'd starved to death.
Sex and kink couldn’t live further apart from each other in my mind. I don’t even get hard during scenes anymore. But watching as Grace sinks her knees into the carpet, feeling her spun-gold hair brush the tops of my feet, my cock can’t help but stiffen.
“Please,” she says, her breath warming my toes.
The only acceptable answer is no. Hell no. So why can’t I say it?
“Get up, Grace.” I slide my hands into the pockets of my sweat pants, pinning my mounting erection down in a way that I hope she won’t notice as she sits back on her heels.
She regards me with eyes that shimmer in the lamplight, her fingers flexing on her thighs. Desperation looks better on her than it has any right to. I knew she’d be even more beautiful on her knees, but I didn’t realize how much I’ve been longing to see her like that.
And I fucking hate myself for it. Grace is seventeen. She needs care and support, not bondage and beatings. But the desire to see what she’d look like strapped to my dungeon bed is slipping through the cracks in my composure.
I need to get out of this room, away from temptation. I can’t think straight while blood’s filling up my dick so close to Grace’s face.
“Come to my office after breakfast tomorrow,” I tell her. “We’ll resume this discussion then.”
“Are you saying you’ll think about it?” Her eyes widen. She wasn’t expecting me to entertain the notion, yet she broached the subject anyway. I’d admire her gumption if it didn’t scare the living hell out of me.
“I’m saying we’ll talk about it tomorrow.”
“Okay.” She’s trying to hide her excitement, but it’s like a presence in the room.
The sadist in me can’t resist poking it.
“The correct response is, yes, Sir.”
She gasps, and the look on her face makes me want to slide my thumb between her teeth.
“Right,” she says. “I mean, right, Sir.”
I go to leave, pausing when I’m halfway out the door.
“I don’t want to see you outside this room again tonight,” I tell her.
She bows her head. “Yes, Sir.”
God help me.
Concentration is hopeless at my desk the next morning. I haven’t been able to stop thinking about Grace since I left her in her room.
Thankfully, Jen is there to direct my attention like a teacher guiding a restless student back to his workbook. She showed up bright and early, ahead of the cleanup crew, overflowing with apologies for having missed Grace’s text message.
“I still can’t believe I turned my phone off,” Jen says.
I glance at her, seated across from my desk, and remind her, “I told you to take the night off.”
“I should’ve at least checked my messages before going to bed. I hope Grace’s unexpected arrival didn’t...disrupt the evening.”
Disrupt doesn’t begin to describe it. Her presence sent a shockwave throughout my meticulously compartmentalized world. What she saw last night, the desires she confessed... It’s changed everything.
I didn’t play with anyone for the rest of the night after I left Grace’s room. I didn’t want to, which is odd considering I’d gone so long without that kind of release.
After the last of the catering staff had cleared out and the house fell silent, I took a shower, crawled into bed, and tried in vain to let the oblivion of sleep distract me from the only other soul in the house. My mind refused to be chained to the bed. It wandered down corridors, into Grace’s room, where the memory of her on her knees was still fresh.
The fantasy should’ve stopped there. It shouldn’t even have started, but it sure as hell shouldn’t have progressed to envisioning her wearing my cuffs, or on the receiving end of my flogger, my crop, my hand coming down hard on her bare ass. Her lithe ballet-honed body twitching and writhing, crying out for more...
Before I knew it, I was humping the mattress like a boy in his childhood bed. It was as if I’d convinced myself that by not touching my cock, I wasn’t really jacking off to the memory of Grace all but begging me to claim her.
I don’t fuck my submissives, but she doesn’t know that. These past few weeks, she’s been researching the lifestyle, assuming that I’m like the Doms in her movies and books. Doms who follow up a hard beating with an even harder fuck.
Grace’s interest in BDSM isn’t the problem. It’s her age and inexperience, her innate naïveté.
What happened with my son’s mother was the result of my own ignorance. You can take every precaution you can think of, and still end up irreparably harming someone in ways you didn’t intend. And negligence aside, there’s no shortage of devils out there. Predators posing as Doms, looking to exploit innocent flesh.
The thought of Grace getting involved with a careless or outright abusive Dom festers like rotten meat in the pit of my stomach. It churns, whipping up anger and dread until I’m physically ill.
I won’t let anything like that happen to her.
A knock sounds on my office door.
My muscles tense. She’s up earlier than usual this morning, because of course she is.
“Let her in,” I say to Jen.
Jen eyes me curiously, then gets up to answer the door.
“Grace, darling,” she says kindly. “Do come in.”
My ward steps into the room, her gaze immediately drawn to mine. She smiles nervously. Her cream-colored dress fits loosely and ends just above her knees. My gaze maps the exposed terrain of her skin, her toned calves and shoulders. The shallow valley between her breasts, left bare by the vee-shaped neckline, is begging to be caressed by hot wax.
“Shall I fix you both a cup of tea?” Jen asks.
I close my laptop and get up from behind my desk.
“That won’t be necessary,” I tell Jen. “Give us a few minutes.”
“Of course.” My assistant pats Grace’s shoulder on her way out of the office.
Grace hits me with another shy smile. “Good morning.”
“Close the door,” I say, and she barely skips a beat before doing as she’s told. I gesture to the sitting area where we first sat together the day she arrived at my home. “Take a seat.”
She claims a spot on the sofa this time so she can fold her legs beneath her. I don’t sit down right away. I want to enjoy the bird’s-eye view my superior position affords for a moment longer.
“How did you sleep?” I ask.
“Not very well,” she says. “You?”
“About the same.”
She shifts position on the sofa, freeing one of her legs. It doesn’t seem intentional on her part, but my gaze is automatically drawn to the naked limb.
“Aidan,” she says. “I want to apologize for crashing your party.”
“You didn’t know I was having one.”
“I know, but I could have stayed in my room and waited until it was over to come find you. I know my being there probably ruined your night.”
“It certainly altered the course of the evening.”
I take the chair across from her. While I wouldn’t say Grace’s presence ruined my night, having a minor at the event put me and my guests at risk. More importantly, it put her at risk to be there without knowing the dungeon rules.
In our community, all uncollared submissives are considered up for grabs by any Dominant. It’s a rule made clear to all guests before they consent to attend a party. Dante believed he was within his rights to punish Grace for spilling a drink on him. If she had been anyone else, no one would’ve batted an eye, though some would’ve stayed to watch.
“Do you wish you’d stayed in your room?” I ask.
She bites her lip, considering her response. If she wants to recant anything she did or said last night, now is her chance.
“No, I don’t.”
She’s not backing down, which means she still wants this, though what I’m willing to offer her probably isn’t the type of arrangement she’s imagined for us.
I can’t guarantee Grace’s safety if she plays with strangers. Any cocky shithead can squeeze into a pair of leather pants and call himself a Dominant without bothering to educate himself on the risks involved. As Grace’s guardian, it’s my responsibility to ensure her wellbeing. If she’s mine, I can keep a closer eye on her than I could if she was merely my ward.
“If I agree to take you on,” I say, “it’s with the acceptance and understanding that I know what is best for you, as a new submissive. Presuming that’s still something you want.”
Her lips drift apart as her chest rises. “It is.”
“This is for training purposes only. A chance to learn from someone who’s experienced. There will be rules and instructions for you to follow, both here and while you’re at school. You will call me Sir from this point forward when we’re alone, unless I say otherwise, and I will refer to you as little one.”
“Yes.” She breathes the word, her gaze centered on my mouth. “I, um, feel like I should probably tell you that I’m a...virgin.”
“I don’t need to know anything about that.”
“Oh.” Her brows knit together in confusion.
I can’t believe that this ray of sunshine would offer me something as precious as her untouched body. I won’t deny it. Thinking about taking Grace’s virginity gets me hard, the same way thinking about tying her up and flogging her gets me hard. I must have a secret masochistic streak if I’m willing to invite this sort of temptation into my life. However, I suspect this arrangement won’t last beyond her eighteenth birthday, once she realizes I can’t give her everything she wants in a Dom.
I’ve kept myself in check for over twenty years; three months is barely a heartbeat by comparison.
“I don’t need to know about that because I’m not going to fuck you,” I tell her. “In fact, I’m not even going to touch you.”
She opens her mouth and then closes it again. As I predicted, she’s not sure what to make of my offer.
“I’m going to train you as a service submissive,” I say. “Do you know what that means?”
“Kind of.” I see her making the mental note to Google the term as soon as I permit her to leave.
“It means I’ll give you tasks to complete and instructions to follow, and you will complete these tasks to the best of your ability.” Since her parents passed away, Grace has been set adrift. I can provide her with structure. Keep her on the right track as she heads into college. “When you perform a task correctly, you will be rewarded. If you fail, you’ll try again.”
I lean forward, resting my elbows just above my knees.
“If you disobey me,” I add, “you will be punished.”
She gasps so softly I barely catch it.
“How will I be punished?”
“Not the way you’re imagining.”
Her cheeks take on an adorable pink glow.
“Would you flog me like you flogged Fiona?”
“I wasn’t punishing Fiona when I flogged her. And flogging you would require touching you, and I’ve already said I’m not going to do that.”
Grace chews her thumbnail. My clever ballerina is doing her best to parse through my reasoning, to understand why I’m proposing this watered-down version of something she’s already seen me fully commit to.
“You still think I’m too young,” she says.
“Because you are too young. I know this isn’t what you were envisioning, but it’s what I’m offering you now. Do you still want to serve me, Grace?”
I know I should hope that she’ll come to her senses and return to her movies and books. It would be simpler for both of us. But, on this, the sadist and the protector in me are in agreement: Grace is safer with me than she would be with anyone else.
