Knowing the Ropes Read online

  She reminded herself firmly that when she’d gotten in the relationship, she’d been clear she wanted to keep it casual, for all kinds of reasons that still applied.

  Besides, even if her feelings had changed, Nick’s hadn’t.

  Alison glanced toward the kitchen door before she answered, a very conspiratorial look accompanied by a smile to match. “So, what would you call him?”

  “Hotter than hell?”

  “Well, duh,” Alison said. “I’ve been at enough play parties with him to know that.”

  The wave of jealousy—completely stupid jealousy, since it had to do with a time when she hadn’t even known Nick, let alone been dating (or whatever the right word was) him—almost dragged her under. She tried to fight it and mostly succeeded, but apparently not quickly enough to hide it from Alison’s quick eyes.

  “Are you sure boyfriend isn’t the right word? Because I saw you turning all green-eyed there, and your eyes are definitely brown.”

  This time, it was Selene’s turn to look at the kitchen door, not to give a sense of we’re all girls together, but to be sure there was no possibility of Nick walking in on them and overhearing.

  “I don’t know what he is. With boyfriends, you go to movies and play mini-golf and go grocery shopping and sit around on Sunday morning in your pajamas drinking coffee and reading the Globe and argue about whose family you’ll see at Thanksgiving. Normal, everyday stuff.”

  “And with Nick?”

  “Mostly we have sex. Amazing sex. Best sex ever. And I wear a collar while I’m doing it and I call him sir, and then I take the collar off and I call him Nick and…then we usually start having sex again anyway. So maybe he’s my fuck-buddy or play partner?”

  “Lover?” Alison suggested. “That covers the super-hot-sex part.”

  Selene shook her head, wondering why she was suddenly feeling down about a situation that, until she’d started analyzing it, had seemed pretty much ideal. “Too romantic. We decided going into it that this wasn’t a romance. It was about a good time and about me learning about BDSM. No mushy stuff allowed. So to get back to your original question, I guess dom’s the right word. But it seems pretty specific, and I think there’s more to it than that. I’m just not sure what.”

  “No mushy stuff, huh?”

  “Nick doesn’t think it mixes with BDSM.”

  Alison let loose a very unladylike snort. “Since when?”

  Oh hell, that hadn’t come out right, had it? Alison and Garth mixed the two just fine, that much was clear, and she certainly didn’t want to sound like she was disparaging her new friends’ relationship or that Nick was. Especially not when Nick and Garth were so close. “I mean,” she backpedaled, “that he doesn’t think it works for him. Obviously it does for you and Garth, but Nick doesn’t think he can keep the right balance if we get too attached.”

  Put that way, it made Nick sound like an asshole. “Don’t get me wrong,” she insisted, carefully setting the last crystal wineglass onto the counter. “I’m not complaining. I was the one who brought it up first, about not getting too serious. I didn’t want to get in over my head. This has been such a learning experience for me, but I was scared of getting overwhelmed. I didn’t know…”

  She stopped and stood there, wringing the dishtowel, unable to continue.

  Alison put an arm around Selene’s shoulders. “I’m sorry I said anything,” she whispered. “Nick seems so happy, and so did you, until I asked.”

  It took Selene a while to corral her wild thoughts and force them into some kind of reasonable order. “It is going well. Too well. Do you know how hard it is not to fall in love with such a great guy when you’re having this much fun?”

  “Yeah, I do,” Alison said. “I was convinced when I was first involved with Garth that a real master would never fall in love with a slave—I’d read too much bad erotica, I guess—and at the same time, I’m human. I still have pride. Didn’t want to be the pathetic girl who fell in love with someone who’d never love her.”

  “So what happened?” Selene could feel her eyes get wide. What woman didn’t like a good love story, especially one that involved hot, taboo sex?

  Alison laughed. “Basically he kidnapped me up to Maine in the middle of winter—with my enthusiastic consent, of course, but it was still the middle of nowhere, with nothing much to do other than eat, sleep and have sex—and alternately beat and fucked me until my brain and my pride melted, and I admitted I was madly in love.”

  “And?” She pretty much knew what the punch line was. It was written all over Garth’s face every time he looked at his wife and the air of good-humored reserve he usually wore dissolved into complete and unabashed adoration.

  “He said something along the lines of, ‘Thank God!’ and apologized for not telling me how he felt sooner, but he’d wanted to force me to admit what I was feeling, at least to myself, before he did. He didn’t quite say that it would have been too embarrassing to pour out his heart to someone—his slave, no less, whose role was to act like he was God—and have her be all ‘meh, that’s nice’, but I could tell it was what he’d been scared of. And then he asked if I’d wear his collar permanently. When I said yes, he proposed.”

  Selene shivered with pleasurable envy. Happy endings always made her feel that way, delighted for the people enjoying them but also wishing for her own someday.

  Once she figured out what her version of a happy ending would be—a cuddly, supportive husband, a harshly erotic master, or someone in between, someone who could slip from one role to the other as mood demanded.

  “I can’t exactly do that to Nick,” she said, smiling but only half-joking.

  And if she could lock him up and have sex with him until his brains ran out his ears, could she actually trust anything he said? Or would he be doing to her what she’d done to Will? Saying what she needed to hear, making her happy because it seemed like the right thing to do.

  Garth and Nick were doing complex things on the grill involving pineapple, bananas and some sort of rum-laced marinade. Ideally—Nick had glanced at the recipe, which was something Garth rarely deigned to do—the fruit should have soaked beforehand and then patted dry, but Garth had forgotten that step and was drizzling the marinade on as they went. It kept threatening to catch fire, not an uncommon occurrence when grilling with Garth. Meticulous about safety in some areas, he was like an unattended small boy around flame.

  Over the sound of sizzling, Garth said, “Selene’s good for you, Nick. Try not to fuck it up.”

  “I don’t plan to, this time. We’re keeping it light and having a great time.” He’d wanted to convey some mixture of drop it and if you have actual advice, I could use some.

  Things were going great with Selene. He just didn’t know where they were going or where he wanted them to go—other than bed. How the hell did you figure something like that out when you’d gone into things resolved to keep it casual? He didn’t want to get into some deep talk with her only to find she wasn’t ready for anything serious, or maybe he really wasn’t. But he didn’t want to ignore the whole question, because that was a bad idea too. He glanced at Garth, hoping he’d either say something profound or forget the line of conversation.

  Garth flipped the pineapple rings, then stared at the sear marks admiringly before he responded. “Selene’s not Natalie, and probably the best way to screw things up with her is to forget that. Hey, hit these with the sauce.”

  When the sauce dripped and flared, he’d never been so glad for Garth’s fondness for dangerous cooking.

  It wasn’t that Garth was wrong. It was that Nick wasn’t ready to consider the implications of what Garth had just said. Be careful what you wish for. He’d wanted profound words of wisdom—but he really hadn’t.

  The grill flare-up was conveniently timed.

  “I have an idea,” Nick said as they flailed at the flaming fruit. “I’ll go to the store for ice cream. And you can explain to Alison why the fire department’s on its way.
”

  The fire department didn’t need to be summoned, and butterscotch-swirl ice cream topped with cooked-down rum sauce and the few surviving bits of fruit proved a more than satisfactory dessert. Nick forgot the conversation with Garth in a wash of good food, a glass of dessert wine and the pleasure of sitting in the screen room with Selene, apparently taking a cue from Alison, sitting at his feet. Not kneeling or anything, just sitting cross-legged, casually, leaning against his bare leg. He couldn’t tell if in her mind it was submissive or just comfortable, and while he planned to ask her later, he didn’t see that one answer was more “right” than the other. Either way, he still got to enjoy the pleasure of her soft brown hair against his thigh, her hand casually tucked around his calf. He got to stroke and occasionally tug at her hair, got to glance down and get a lovely view of her cleavage and gloat to himself, Mine! All mine!

  Yeah, life was good.

  At least it was until Selene’s cell phone rang with a ringtone he’d never heard before. Aretha Franklin singing “Rescue Me”.

  If that hadn’t made it obvious, the look on Selene’s face and the speed with which she excused herself to go outside with her phone did.

  Nick’s body tightened. A rush of adrenaline pumped through him, readying him for action, whatever action might be useful. At the same time, the lovely meal formed an uneasy lump in his stomach and the sip of wine he’d just taken soured in his mouth.

  Quietly, he excused himself as well and followed Selene. Did his best not to hover over her, did his best not to eavesdrop. Failed on both counts. But pacing up and down the back deck helped the queasiness and the jumpy urge to do something even if it was wrong.

  The call took only a couple of minutes, but it seemed he paced for hours in the summer dusk while Selene made notes on a piece of scrap paper from her purse and occasionally made soothing noises into the phone.

  Finally, Selene folded her phone back up, came to him, and buried her head against his chest. Nothing sexual there, just a creature seeking warmth and comfort, and he gave it back in the same spirit.

  “She’s ready,” Selene said at last. “I’m not sure what the last straw was. She was having trouble being coherent enough to give me directions, but she’s ready. And apparently he’s not coming home tonight. Something about teaching her to appreciate him, but it’s convenient for us.” She pulled away then, and Nick saw resoluteness in her face, focus. Zeal, even.

  As Selene left a phone message warning her boss at the temp job that she was sick and would most likely miss work the next day, Nick went to make excuses to their hosts.

  It was no surprise that Garth and Alison both immediately offered to help.

  Nick flailed, not answering immediately. His instincts told him no, that this was his job, but he was pretty sure that was his inner caveman talking, or maybe his guilty conscience, not anything reasonable. “Ask Selene,” he finally said. “She’s the professional here. I’m just the muscle.”

  ”Thanks, but we need stealth and speed. I don’t trust that this guy won’t come back, so the sooner we get on the road…”

  Garth handed Nick his car keys. “Take the Denali. There’s room for her stuff, and room for people to stretch out in the back and nap. It’s going to be a long night.”

  Garth ran out to get large iced coffees from the nearest Dunkin’ Donuts while Alison raided her closet for flip-flops and clothes for Natalie. Fifteen minutes later they were on the road in Garth’s big navy blue Denali, heading toward New Hampshire.

  Nick fidgeted in his seat, wishing he hadn’t had that last glass of wine. At the moment, Selene was behind the wheel, but if he could focus on driving, he’d have some distraction from the ugly fears in his head.

  What if the guy came back?

  What if they were too late?

  Chapter Twenty

  Silence surrounded them like a pall as they headed north. Usually Selene and Nick had no trouble bantering about sex, talking about life in general, but Selene found she didn’t have the heart for casual chatting and certainly not for sexual innuendo, and while Nick kept his hand on her thigh as she drove, resting it at the line where skirt and skin met a few inches above her knees, it didn’t seem to burn into her skin like it usually did.

  She didn’t know if he’d shut down that channel of fierce, erotic possession between them in the face of Natalie’s troubles or if she was just too anxious to feel it.

  Had Natalie been quivering with excitement and anticipation and the thrill of a new relationship when she made this trip the first time, followed the long, dull snake of Route 95 onto New Hampshire Route 4? She must have been, since she’d been going to move in with the master of her dreams.

  Who turned out to be the creep of her nightmares.

  Selene had had her own fantasies of late, not the stock harem girl or barely-clad-slave-girl-with-big-brawny-mercenary fantasies that had haunted her since before she had a clear idea what the barely clad couple might be up to.

  Very specific fantasies involving a tasteful collar like Alison’s, a place at Nick’s feet, calling him Master and obeying him not as a game but for real. She saw herself more like Alison than O in The Story of O, still having a career but submitting, serving and enjoying regular floggings, spankings, bondage and all the other hot games with pleasure and pain, control and release, to which she’d become addicted since meeting Nick. Nick’s, full-time and forever.

  Suddenly those fantasies seemed scarier than they had before.

  Oh, they’d always seemed scary, but in the roller-coaster way, not the serial-killer way.

  Now, thinking of that vibrant, beautiful girl in Nick’s photographs and the broken, defeated woman she’d heard on the phone, they just seemed creepy, not quite suicidal but akin to morbid, depressed fantasies of attending your own funeral and seeing who bothered to show up.

  The fact that she knew Nick was nothing like Natalie’s asshole only made it so much better.

  She’d gotten lucky, meeting him.

  As she drove, she stole occasional glances at his pensive profile, his gaze locked out on the dull scenery off the highway. Yeah, lucky to be sure. And that had already been putting her in a quandary because she was starting to care far more than he’d want her to.

  If on top of that she became nervous about playing, needed to pull back from the control games and the rougher sex for a while, would he still want her, or would he drift away?

  When they got off the highway, the little town at the exit was black and quiet except for the flickering light of televisions in a few windows and a cluster of older teens hanging out in the parking lot of a blessedly still-open convenience store.

  Even more blessedly, the woman behind the counter actually had some notion where Chapman’s Township was, because the GPS didn’t. Between Natalie’s somewhat garbled directions, the clerk’s advice and a map detailed enough to show the back roads, they were able to piece together what looked like a viable route. Nick didn’t know this part of New Hampshire well, but he’d been to North Conway several times, which was better than Selene could say, so she let him take the wheel.

  In their rush, they hadn’t grabbed Nick’s iPod out of his car, and the few CDs floating around the SUV were Baroque classics too mellow for a tense night drive. Selene fiddled with the radio until she found a station that came in halfway decently on the mountain roads.

  Predictably, it was country. “Reminds me of home,” she muttered. That got them onto the subject of radio stations and from there to music in general, the good, the bad and the just plain wacky.

  Somewhere along the line, Nick exclaimed, “I had no idea you liked Freezepop too!”

  Selene said, “I think the whole ‘which bands do you like?’ conversation was one we skipped in favor of you spanking me or introducing me to butt plugs or something. Not,” she added quickly, “that that’s a problem. Just an observation.”

  “I hope it’s not a problem. Because when this mess is settled and Nat’s safe somewhere�
�and we’ve had some sleep—I’ll want to take the paddle to your sweet ass until it’s pink and tender and telling the world just how naughty you are, and then see if you’re ready for a bigger butt plug. I do love fucking you when you’ve got something in your ass. It makes you even tighter, and you get so wild…”

  “Nick, I’m not sure…”

  He paused, turned to look at her, although he probably couldn’t see all that much in the darkness. Suggestions and shadows, just like she could see of him. “I can’t believe I just said that,” he said. “I mean, with Natalie and everything, I really wasn’t thinking about sex. At least I wasn’t thinking about it as much as I normally do when we’re together. But all you had to do was say the word spanking, and there I was. Hard. And I’m sorry. It’s probably inappropriate, but talking about how much I want you seemed better than worrying.”

  It took Selene a while to answer, a while in which she squirmed in her seat, shifting her thighs against each other and forcing herself to be honest. “No need to apologize,” she finally said. “I feel weird about it too, but I’m wet now. Wet enough that I want to pull over somewhere and beg you to spank me under the stars—and extra points if we attract a state trooper. And I feel really, really shallow. I mean, poor Natalie’s in trouble because of kinky sex…”

  “Stop right there! Nat’s in trouble because I wasn’t what she needed, so she hooked up with someone who turned out to be a nutcase. It’s not BDSM. It’s people.”

  Her first thought was that he made sense, that vanilla people got into screwed-up, even dangerous relationships too. Violent loons and the people who unfortunately loved them were everywhere, and most of them weren’t prettying it up in the guise of consensual kink.

  Her second thought, though, was the one she actually articulated. “You can’t blame yourself, either. It’s obvious to me you loved her. She did what she thought was best for her. She was wrong, and it sucks, and you’re doing more than a lot of people would do for an ex.”