She put her finger through one of the hooks and tugged. It had been a long time since she’d let a man dominate her. She was straight, more or less, but she didn’t feel safe being with men, not unless Mistress Nora was with her, protecting her. Even then, the more famous she got and the more she had to lose, the harder it was to trust someone new with a secret that personal, that potentially career-ending.

  And that was fine. Sheridan could manage her own needs well enough. Except Mistress Nora and her whole crew were moving down to New Orleans, leaving Sheridan all alone in New York. Alone and lonely, which was why Mistress Nora had given her a very special gift of two hours with Brad Wolfe. If Mistress Nora trusted him with her, Sheridan would trust him, too.

  No matter how good he was, he couldn’t take the loneliness away for longer than two hours. But two hours was better than nothing.

  The door opened and closed behind her. She stood frozen in place by the fireplace, waiting for orders.

  “Warm enough?” Brad asked as he made a circuit of the room, shutting the curtains. When they were closed, it felt like this was the only room in the world, and they were the only two people left on earth.

  “Yes, sir.”

  He strode over to her and stood in front of her. Without any fanfare or asking for permission, he reached for her belt and unbuckled it. He tossed it on the club chair. Then he sat on the trunk in front of the fireplace and tapped his thigh. She knew what to do. She brought her foot up and rested it on his leg while he unzipped her boot, which he tossed aside, as well. Then the other boot. He stood up quickly and just as quickly pulled her dress up and over her head. It ended up on the floor with her shoes.

  She stood in front of him wearing only her panties, her stockings and garters, and her lace-trimmed bra. If the lingerie did anything for him, he didn’t show it. With a single twirl of his finger, he told her to turn her back to him. When she did, he unhooked her bra and slid it off. After that, her garters were gone, her stockings slid down her legs, and finally, her panties.

  “Better,” he said. She smiled though he couldn’t see it. He laid his hands on her shoulders and then slid them down her arms and up her back. She sighed, her body remembering how good this felt, with two large, strong male hands on her skin. She shivered in pleasure as he stroked her back and hips, then ran his hands over her lower stomach and up to her breasts. Her small breasts almost disappeared under his enormous hands. The heat of his palms stoked the fire in her belly. She closed her eyes as his thumbs found her nipples and lightly rubbed them until they were hard as diamonds on her chest. His thumbs first, then his index and middle fingers made tiny circles around her areolas.

  She began to relax a little, to let the heat of the fire seep into her skin. Incredible how Brad’s hands could be so delicate with her, so precise and skillful. It felt so good she leaned back against him, and he was like a wall behind her, unyielding.

  “Good girl,” he said. His right hand slid from her breast to her stomach, then lower. He cupped her between the legs. Firmly. So firmly that when he pulled her closer, she came up on her toes. He held her there by her cunt, before letting her down gently. His finger stroked the slit of her vulva, slowly opening the folds, caressing the inner lips until it found the opening of her vagina. His fingertip made little circles on the hole, again and again, until Sheridan could barely stand. She had to put her hands on the fireplace mantel to steady herself.

  He was making her wet, and there was no way to pretend he wasn’t—she knew he could feel every drop. Did he understand why she was so wet? It wasn’t the touch itself that did it—she’d been fingered by vanilla boys before without feeling anything but boredom—but because he did it like he had every right to her cunt.

  It was starting to overwhelm her, his finger at the entrance but not inside. She arched her back. She wanted him to push in, go deep. Instead, he wrapped his other arm around her stomach to steady her. Then he pulled his hand away from her pussy and brought it down hard onto her ass.

  She cried out, shocked by the sudden slap, the breathtaking pain. She’d been hit with a wooden paddle before, and it hadn’t hurt as much as the powerful slap of his hand against her skin. It stung, burned, and before she’d absorbed the shock of it, he did it again. Another slap to her ass so hard she cried out. He was holding her so tightly in place she couldn’t move away. Again and again, his hand came down, fast and hard, brutally hard. Whimpers escaped her lips, growing louder and more hopeless every time he struck her. She wanted it to be over. She wanted it never to end.

  But it ended.

  Without warning, he stopped. Sheridan sagged against his chest, and he held her close to keep her from falling to her feet in exhaustion. Sheridan panted and shook.

  He laughed. A soft laugh, more a warm chuckle than an outright laugh. The rigid, unyielding wall of his chest moved with the sound.

  “All that, and we’ve only just gotten started,” he said. “Poor little girl.”

  “It hurt,” she said, beating her fist uselessly against his iron stomach.

  “That’s not how we behave, is it?”

  She punched him again, which was about as effective as a butterfly slapping an oak tree. “It hurt, sir. Mistress Nora warns me first.”

  He found her chin with his hand and forced her to look at him. He studied her face with barely concealed amusement.

  “Do I…look like Mistress Nora to you?”

  Before she could answer, he sat down on the top of the trunk and pulled her across his lap.

  The second round of spanking hurt worse than the first. His thighs were hard against her stomach, and she couldn’t get comfortable. The harder she struggled, the more each strike of his bare hand hurt. She struggled to take a deep breath. Each slap echoed in the quiet room, quiet but for her grunts of pain and cries of agony.

  Then he was done. Again. But was he? She lay like a corpse across his legs, head hanging down. Then he cupped her cunt again, one finger stroking the slit of her vulva. With each stroke, his finger went deeper through the folds until it found the entrance of her vagina again.

  She was so wet he could have fisted her. He must have had the same thought because he suddenly thrust three fingers into her, fast and deep, pushing into her body without resistance. Three fingers were deep in her, and it still wasn’t enough—not for her or him. He drove in a fourth finger, then turned his hand and pressed his thumb inside her. She felt the knuckle of it graze the hollow under her pubic bone, her g-spot, and she raised her head, crying out with a sudden spasm of her cunt around her hand.

  “Good girl,” he said as he fucked her with his hand. Not his whole hand, not his fist, but enough of him that she felt herself spreading apart, opening up. He was merciless, working her with his hand. He was forcing her to orgasm as if she had no control of her body. And she didn’t. She couldn’t even move, he was holding her down so hard, and her feet couldn’t touch the ground. Dizzy, blood rushing to her head as she hung over his legs, and inside her body, his long thick fingers made circles inside of her, exploring and probing her. Every time she gasped at either pain or pleasure, he repeated the action that brought it on as if she were a game he was playing. And what was the prize? Her orgasm? Her tears? Both?

  He wouldn’t stop until he’d won, whatever the game. He worked her harder on his hand until she was spread so wide open she had to arch her back again to take everything he gave her. And she loved it. She hated that she loved it, but she loved it. She wasn’t like the women who needed pleasure to feel pleasure. She needed to be possessed to feel pleasure, needed to be used to feel pleasure, needed to be forced to feel pleasure. And since he was forcing her to come, she would come. Not to please herself but to please him.

  She didn’t have to make her body obey her. Her body obeyed him. He moved his fingers faster inside her, pushed in and up, spreading her out until her vagina felt splayed open like a butterfly’s wings pinned to velvet. She squirmed on his hand, on his lap as the pressure built to a breaking point. Speared and spread out, she raised her head and cried out. Her orgasm tore through her stomach, her hips, her cunt. Her vagina fluttered and spasmed around his fingers, nearly forcing them out of her. But he wouldn’t be forced. He pushed back in, fucking her even as she came, each thrust of his fingers sending a wave of sharp sensation through her, another spasm, forcing another cry from her throat.

  Her climax faded, but still she lay across his lap, limp as a ragdoll. He was still inside her, but now his touch was gentle, massaging her sleek inner walls, soothing the soreness.

  “Does Mistress Nora do that to you?” he asked. He was mocking her.

  “Yes, sir,” Sheridan replied. “But your hand’s a lot bigger.”

  He laughed, big and loud. “I’d worry if Mistress Nora had hands as big as mine.”

  Then carefully, as if he knew how tender she was inside, he removed his fingers from her. Then he eased her up, turning her to face him, and sat her on his lap like a child. The soft silky wool fabric of his trousers felt rough against her sore cunt, and she winced as he sat her down on his thigh. He saw the expression but offered only a smile in response.

  Her hair had come loose around her face, and he pushed it off her forehead.

  She saw him looking at her body, her breasts, her belly. Did he think they were too pale? Did they need his welts, his bruises?

  “That was a nice start, wasn’t it?” he asked.

  Sheridan blinked at him.

  “Wait. Start?”

  FOUR

  Brad didn’t laugh, but it was a close call. Did Sheridan have any idea how adorably shocked she looked? Probably not. But the image of her sitting naked on his lap, face flushed from her time upside down on his lap, hair loose, eyes wide… He would remember that look for a long time. Her face, her eyes, how she felt wrapped tight around his hand as he made her come so hard she screamed…

  His cock was already remembering it. He was stiff, and her leg resting lightly against his penis wasn’t helping.

  She groaned in despair and rested her forehead on his shoulder, seeking comfort from the same source as her suffering.

  “You are a very spoiled rotten submissive,” he said into her ear. “Whining? Punching me? Mistress Nora didn’t teach you any manners, did she?”

  “She likes spoiling me, sir, and I like being spoiled. And I don’t think she knows any manners, so I’m not sure how she could teach me any.”

  “Ah, fair point.” He laughed again and kissed her forehead. “It’s all right. I like that you’re spoiled and badly behaved.”

  “You do, sir?”

  “Bad habits demand correction. Bad behavior demands punishment.”

  “More punishment?”

  “I haven’t begun to punish you yet.”

  “What was the spanking for then?” she demanded.

  “For pleasure. Mine.”

  He plucked her off his lap and set her on her feet. Then he stood up in front of her. Once again, he was struck by how small she was, petite, delicate. She had no idea how careful he’d been with her, not hitting nearly as hard as he could have. And even so, her small soft buttocks were already blood red and turning purple with bruises. He ran his hands over them, feeling the heat radiating off her. She made soft groans as he stroked her sore skin, but she didn’t try to move away from his touch. She stood still against him, leaning into him, accepting everything he did to her. He looked down and saw her eyes were closed, and her small hands clung tightly to the fabric of his suit vest. He felt a wave of sudden unexpected emotion. No, emotions—possessiveness, tenderness, desire, need, hunger, lust, affection. Lurking behind them all was relief. He’d been afraid he would never be able to enjoy kink like this again, not after how badly things had ended last time, and knowing he could, thanks to Sheridan, was a weight off his shoulders.

  He would have to send Nora a thank you note for his Christmas gift.

  “Kneel,” he ordered.

  Sheridan hesitated, probably thinking he would make her suck him off. She knelt on the rug in front of the fireplace and waited.

  All his gear—floggers, whips, spreader bars, and more—were neatly packed inside the steamer trunk. But what he wanted wasn’t there. It was in the hall closet.

  He looked back as he left the room and saw her eyes dart his way, a look of surprise that he was leaving. She wasn’t the only one. He really shouldn’t be doing what he was doing, but he told himself it was out of spite and nothing else.

  He opened the closet and found what he was looking for—a square white box with a white lid tied with a red ribbon. He carried back into the dungeon and shut the door behind him. Sheridan was still waiting on her knees. He could have stood in the doorway looking at her beautiful naked body for an hour, but he didn’t want to waste another moment. Midnight would be here before they knew it, and he was already regretting the minutes he’d made her wait for him in the living room.

  She glanced up at him, confused, when she set the box on the rug in front of her.

  “Merry Christmas,” he said, though Christmas had come and gone already. “Open it.”

  As ordered, she untied the red ribbon and lifted the white lid off the white box. A thin sheet of white tissue paper came next, and under the tissue paper…

  “Oh,” Sheridan said, blue eyes bright. “These are beautiful, sir.”

  He watched with pleasure as she lifted the fur-lined leather wrist cuffs, palest pink, from the box. Matching ankle cuffs next. Then, finally, the collar. A thin collar for a woman’s slender neck, hand-made, hand-tooled. Stamped into the leather were the words, Property of Brad Wolfe.

  She looked at him and smiled. “For me?”

  “Tonight.”

  He held out his hand, and she gave him a wrist cuff. He wrapped it around her right wrist, then her left. He made her lay on her back and offer him her legs. A glorious vision, Sheridan naked and on her back, legs up in the air, feet on his stomach while he cuffed her ankles.

  And then he ordered her to kneel again. Her hair was like silk on his fingers as he brushed it back and buckled the collar around her neck. As soon as the collar was on, she rested her full, if slight, weight against him. The collar could do that to some submissives, transforming their willing, if nervous, submission into total surrender.

  He took a moment—only one—to enjoy the sight of them in the mirror together. He was still fully dressed in his three-piece suit. She was naked but for her collar and cuffs. He stood. She knelt. He commanded. She obeyed. For the first time in months, he felt like himself again, like a man. A man and a wolf.

  “Ready?” he asked softly.

  She nodded, eyes closed, the slightest smile on her lovely lips.

  “Ready, sir.”

  FIVE

  A collar. Sheridan was wearing a collar. She’d never worn a collar before except when Mistress Nora had put her on a leash.

  This was different. A collar with a leash was a tool. A collar without a leash was a symbol. But of what? She didn’t belong to Brad Wolfe. Only for these two private, secret hours. Still…it felt so right on her neck, soft as satin, comfortable as a second skin. It cast a spell on her. For the next two hours, she would do anything he wanted. It had taken away any desire to say no.

  Actually, that wasn’t it. It had taken away nothing from her. It had given her something—the desire to please him any way she could and to do for him anything he asked.

  Anything.

  He cupped her under her chin and lifted her face to meet his eyes. She could have looked at him from that angle all night. He was handsome, breathtakingly so. This was a man born to stand while others knelt. Or was that the collar working its spell on her brain again? She didn’t know. When he ran his thumb over her lips, she didn’t care either.

  He pushed his thumb past her lips, past her teeth, then pressed down on her tongue, forcing her to open her mouth. She knew what came next and wanted it to come. With her mouth adequately wide, he unbuttoned his trousers and unzipped them. No underwear. Not a surprise. He took his penis out and held it in one hand, his thumb caressing the tip. His cock was everything she wanted it to be, especially the thick head, wet with the first drops of semen.

  “Arms up,” he said, and she held her arms over his head. His left hand held her wrists up and against his chest. With his right hand, he cupped her head and guided her mouth around his cock.

  She took the head into her mouth and sucked lightly on it, tasting the salt of his come, relishing the subtle aching of her jaw as she opened her mouth even wider to take more of him. It was bliss…being used by a powerful man for his own pleasure. Why couldn’t she have this every day? Every night? Because of her work, of course. Because no one could know this was the real her. So she’d commit this moment to memory though no memory or fantasy was as potent as the thick hard cock down her throat.

  Brad’s penis nudged the back of her throat. The tiniest cry escaped her lips, and immediately he pulled it out. With one powerful, graceful tug of his hand, he drew her to her feet. She dropped her chin to her chest and coughed.

  He held her against him, lightly rubbing her back. “Choking or crying?” he asked softly in her ear.

  “Both…sir.”

  He didn’t say anything, only held her. She could feel his cock—still hard—against her stomach. She liked that. She liked that choking or crying didn’t turn him off. Real masters saw tears all the time, made subs choke and gag and thrash and scream. The good ones accepted it. The best ones enjoyed it.

  He was clearly enjoying it.

  As he held her close, he rubbed his erection into her stomach. She pressed her body closer to his, then wrapped her hand around the shaft and held it firmly, stroking it. She watched herself touching him, her palm sliding down the length to the soft thatch of dark hair at the base and then pulling up and up to the head again, where semen was beading.