Lady, I don't even know what I'm doing here. I don't know why I haven't ripped you in half for touching me. "I don't know."
"Sure you do," she said, and began to steer me toward the cross.
Everything in me, every self defense mode, every alarm system, began clamoring to be heard over the ringing in my ears which had grown really very loud.
"I think you get enough leading in the outside world," the voice said.
I could tell from where her voice sounded she was taller than my five-six, but not much. No real trace of an accent, just western U.S. No ethnic tone either.
So one of how many million white girls in the area? She sounded young.
Sure, I could identify her in a line up.
But the cop part of me was falling away. The yearning was changing, the tension and anxiety and nausea easing as a different desire started to surface.
From somewhere so very far away I heard my phone ring. One of the hands left my shoulder and dived into my right back pocket, pulled out the offending piece of technology and handed it off to a man so large I was peripherally aware of him even without turning to look.
I had no idea why I was submitting to any of this. It went against every common sense rule I lived by and even more by the paranoia that was ingrained by my cop father, my own training, my black belt.
But I'd paid money to be here. The stripes across my ass had healed. The bruising Cole St. Martin had put there had faded.
The craving, the addiction, was starting to rage in me. I didn't know where Cole was or if he could actually help me.
I didn't feel like I had anything to lose. I'd come here on purpose. I knew what went on in a place like this.
I couldn't very well say Please don't hurt me.
What did I want? I wanted out of myself. At the most basic level. I wanted something Cole could give me if I could find him.
No. If I could find him and if I could let him. If I could let go and allow him to do what I knew this time he would do. Because this time I wouldn't be sold by some bad cop This time I'd be there on my own, saying Help me.
He would.
But there's always a price.
So did I want to know what I could take? Or did I just want to take it. Be broken down and emptied out and allowed to fill myself back up?
"Move to the cross," the voice behind me said. "Why are you trying to turn? What do you want to see?"
"You," I said honestly.
Another laugh. "Will that change anything that's going to happen?"
"I don't know what's going to happen," I said.
She didn't laugh this time. "You shouldn't lie. Next you'll be saying you don't know why you came here."
"I know why I came here. I just can't tell you."
"That's okay. I can guess."
I stopped because I'd reached the cross. The hands left my shoulders, reached down and tugged at the t-shirt I'd tucked into my jeans. She pulled it over my head, my arms raising automatically without her asking. I felt her fingers, warm and smooth, undo the clasp of my bra, felt the slightly chill air of the dungeon caress my nipples. They were hard. I was wet.
"Hands up."
I almost laughed. I'd been on the force several years and I'd never said that yet. But there was nothing funny. I moved to the cross, lifted my arms, allowed my faceless guide to wrap leather cuffs around my wrists and secure them to a set of O-rings.
The instant the restraints were fastened I felt a surge of relief rush through me. For the first time in six years I had responsibility for absolutely nothing. I had brought myself here. I had chosen this. I had relinquished control.
Whatever happened, I was not responsible. Like a rape fantasy, like a bondage scenario between middle-aged couples living out their kink without ever admitting they had it.
"What's your safe word?" She asked, her lips tickling my ear.
I'm a cop. Said really fast, all the words strung together.
I didn't have one. Of course I didn't. I'd never been in a position to need one until Cole and he wouldn't have allowed me one.
Mercy had to be overused. Ditto red. I froze, wanting somehow to convince her I wasn't that new, I understood some of what was going on, I wasn't hopelessly stupid.
Mark. Tomlin. Stop, no, don't were all clearly out of the question. Cat, dog, too generic. Father too weird. Cole too direct.
"Vegas," I said, when it seemed like she was going to start early just to force me to tell her.
"Vegas, huh? That's a new one."
I felt her pull away from me. The noise level in the place hadn't dropped. Most people were still doing whatever they'd been doing the short couple minutes ago that this had been happening. Maybe the giant was watching. Maybe he didn't give a shit. Maybe no one did.
Maybe it didn't matter.
"Vegas," she repeated, and without warning, she struck my shoulders and back with a flogger.
Best I could tell it was made of some kind of leather, suede maybe, buttery soft, falling like a soft thud, a gentle swish, a pull of friction over my skin. Pleasant, somehow, as was the giving up of all responsibility. I didn't even mind being half naked in this place. They'd all seen far more than me, and maybe those sessions with Jesse well within the gang's hearing had somewhat inured me.
She didn't tell me to count or to thank her or ask for my participation for which I was grateful. The flogger rose and fell, and the stroking turned to something firmer and from that to something hotter. The longer she worked on my back, my shoulders, my triceps as they strained against the bonds, the hotter the strikes felt, the more edged the strips of leather, the more it felt super-heated.
The more I leaned back into it, feeling tears gather at the edges of my eyes for reasons I couldn't be bothered to try and understand. If I couldn't break down here, where could I?
What had been pleasant changed into a burn. What had been simple emotion turned into a storm.
I fought it, my teeth gritted, my hands fisted with my nails digging into my own flesh. My head flew back and I gave my body into her ministrations but my mind I tried to keep free and my own.
Until I hit some barrier and crossed it, crashing down the other side. I tensed, head back, poised as if I might scream and tear myself free of the cross.
And then sagged. The tears came readily. My cheeks were slick with them, my nose running, my throat making sounds of distress even I couldn't understand.
From the other side of everything I could hear her voice, her words a nonsensical mantra of comfort and understanding. Gentle hands on both sides released my wrists from the cuffs. None of those belonged to Kat? because she was behind me, waiting to receive my weight when I was released.
Still behind me, she guided me to a dark corner, a low, soft couch, a microfleece blanket. She sat on the couch first, the shadows keeping her face from view, and turned me, wrapped in the blanket, so I faced away from her before she pulled me down into her lap, wrapping her arms around me.
"You can look at me now," she whispered.
"Is it all right if I don't?" I asked.
Her laugh came easily. "Of course it is. Just ride the endorphins," she said, and rocked me, blanket and all, wet, hot face and all.
And for a little while, the world and all its problems went away.
I came to feeling utterly disgusted with myself. This wasn't me. No matter how much I needed Cole or thought I did, or how much I wanted to find a way out of the shit I'd fallen into.