E l y s e inclair brushes past me and shuts the connecting door behind us. It closes with an ominous thud, and suddenly I’m a bird trapped in a cage, my chest tight with panic. I tear my gaze away from the contraption and up to Sinclair. “You okay?” he asks. I guess the cool-girl game face I was hoping to portray isn’t so strong. “Yeah.” “Have you seen one of these before?” “Um—at a ren faire, maybe?” He gives a low chuckle. “Figures. It’s called a pillory.” “I thought they were called stocks,” I say faintly, surveying the contraption. It’s one of those waist-high wooden frames that medieval villagers used to get locked up in for bad behavior: a horizontal plank, split in two for access, with holes for the wrists and the neck. This being Alchemy, it’s made from beautifully polished wood, and the circular holes are lined with what looks like padded red satin. Nope. Doesn’t make it any less terrifying. “Stocks are similar, but they just restrain the ankles,” Sinclair says. Somebody knows their medieval kink. That’s probably a gigantic red flag right there. I don’t say anything, just stare at this ancient punishment— and humiliation—device. I sense him turning toward me. “You didn’t check restraints as a hard limit.” “No,” I agree, though this feels like a bait-and-switch situation. I was expecting to be on a freaking bed with maybe some handcuffs, but I’m quickly realizing that there’s no place for naivety with a guy this slippery. “Do we have a problem?” “No,” I r epeat, braving a glance at him. His expression is stern. “Elyse, I’m not in the business of ignoring women’s boundaries. Believe me, this will be a lot more fun for both of us if you feel comfortable.” We’re way beyond comfortable, my friend. In any case, only one of us will be having any so-called fun tonight. “I’m okay,” I tell him. “I’ll try it.” “Do you know why I requested this piece of equipment?” he asks me. I really hope that’s a rhetorical question. There’s no way I’m entering into a guessing game with him. I wait. “I want to fuck you on it, sure. But I also want to take my time and get to know your body, and I thought this would be a novel way to ke ep you still while I do so. What do you think of that?” I’m unsure what I think because my brain is shattering into tiny pieces, as if it’s made of delicate glass and Sinclair’s words are a vat of boiling water. If I thought this dude’s apparent awkwardness would stop him
from saying the most outrageous things to my face without batting an eye, then clearly I’ve majorly underestimated him. “Okay,” I say, jerking back to look at the thingy. I can’t meet those searing blue eyes anymore. I have to forcibly stop myself from gathering the neckline of my robe more tightly together. “‘Okay.’ What a spectacular declaration of consent.” I start to shake. I can’t help it. I feel so small and vulnerable next to him. He’s in his billionaire uniform of black slacks and a crisp white shirt, neck open, and I’m far too close to being naked. “I don’t know what you want from me,” I whisper, willing myself not to cry in front of him. It’s true. I don’t. What is he expecting—that I put on some kind of performance? Turn into a porn star for the evening? “Hey.” He’s in front of me in a flash, standing between me and it, tipping my chin up so I’m forced to look at him. He smells really, really good. His cologne is subtle. Refined. Herb-based, maybe? Axe it is not. “I don’t need anything from you,” he says. “I should have made that clear. I’ll do everything. You don’t need to do a thing here. But I do need your consent.” For a moment, I wonder if he’s planning on kissing me. It was a limit on the list, but I didn’t check it, obviously. If he’s going to pay me ten grand, he can kiss me. The only problem is that my mouth has gone dry. My eyes dart to the clock on the wall. It’s already nine-oh-five. “Forget the time,” he says, looking at my mouth. “I’ve come here for quality, not quantity. If it takes a while for you to get comfortable, then it takes a while. Got it?” He doesn’t kiss me, just watches me intently until I say, “You have my consent.” He nods and releases my chin, taking a st ep back. “Good. Then take off your robe.” I knew it was coming, of course, but it’s still a shock. I look down and pull the silk tie loose easily, despite my still-shaking hands. It’s only the first st ep in what will be a grueling hour, but I didn’t expect it to feel quite so uncomfortable to strip off, stone-cold sober, in front of a total stranger. This is insane. I’ve done a million lingerie shoots. I strip off in front of photographers and God knows how many of their crew members all the time. But not like this. Never like this. What will he think? Will he like what he sees? What he’s paid for? The robe swings open, exposing a strip of skin between my breasts and down over my stomach and beyond. My hands go to the lapels. “Look at me while you take it off.” It’s not a request, but his voice is gruff. I look up at him and shrug the robe off my shoulders, the silk snagging on my nipples as I do. It slithers down my arms and I catch it with my fingers before it can fall to the floor. His eyes are all over me. I feel his gaze as viscerally as if it were his fingers, his tongue, on my skin. He swallows as he raises them back to my face, his pupils drowning out the blue. “You’re extremely beautiful,”
he says. “Throw the robe on the bed.” I ball it up and do as he says. With a last, hungry look, he turns away and lifts the top half of the pillory thing up and over until it hangs vertically on its hinge. Open, the contraption looks a little less scary. He turns back to me. “Let’s get you into position so I can enjoy you properly.” Here goes nothing. Oh my dear Lord. I will never be able to go to a ren faire ever again. I st ep forward, raising my arms so I can gather my hair up in one fist. He fixes that blue gaze on my exposed breasts. It’s only as I bend forward that I realize how very low this thing is. Tiny thong aside, my ass is going to be on full display for him, which I’m sure is the entire idea. Again: oh my dear Lord. I bend forward, laying my throat against the cool satin lining the neck hole. It is indeed padded. I release my hair so it hangs in a curtain to my left and find the other nooks for my wrists. “How’s that?” he asks. “It’s fine.” He brings the upper half back over and it clunks heavily into place. Shit. Suddenly a lot less fine. I twist my hands. There’s room around my wrists, but not much. Not enough to pull out. The satin, padded though it may be, constrains my throat. I may have to rely on pure ab strength to hold myself at this angle. “I have a support for you,” he says, and I crane my neck as best I can to see what he means. It’s standing up against the wall and looks almost exactly like one of those collapsible suitcase racks you get in hotel rooms, exc ept that the support part is made from a single wide strip of leather. He opens it and slides it under my upper stomach. It’s exactly the right height for me, which means it’s holding up my middle. A brief wave of relief crashes over me. “How do you feel?” he asks from where he’s standing, behind me and off to the left. I feel exactly like a rabbit caught in a trap. I feel uncomfortable and exposed. One of the weirdest parts is having my view limited. I can see the ground below me, and even his shoes, but not directly back—the wooden plank stops me from dipping my chin properly. I can see the far wall in front, but if he came to stand in front of me, I wouldn’t be able to tilt my head up enough to see his face. I’m hyperconscious that my ass is on display. It’s the strangest position I’ve ever been in. I bet John Gage didn’t put Diana through this in his stateroom. Sylvie and I have always had a strong view that he was a dirty, skillful bastard, but this is a whole other level of d epravity. Clearly, our imaginations are a lot more limited than we realized. I don’t say any of that, obviously. “I feel okay.” “Good.” He skims a couple of fingertips lightly down the bumps of my bare spine, stopping just before the waistband of my thong. I’m not expecting it, and I startle. “Safe word?” “Uh, raven.” It takes me a moment to conjure it up. Must do better. Got to ke ep it close at hand. “Say it if you need it.”
And then he’s touching me for real, hands squeezing my waist and then sliding up my sides. Reaching one arm around, the stiff cotton of his shirt sleeves brushing against my back, so he can find both my breasts. Cupping them, weighing them where they hang freely for him. He rolls my nipples. Pinches them hard. A sudden flare of white-hot pleasure lances through me, taking me by shock, and I gasp without meaning to. What sounds like a pleased little huff from him. “I see. It’s like that, is it?” He doubles down, pinching and rolling and squeezing and kneading, and my gasps turn to little staccato noises in the back of my throat. In this position, it feels as though he’s milking me. I have a view of my bare feet with their pale-pink-painted toenails and of his highly polished black shoes and black pants off to the left, but I can’t see his hands on me. The wood blocks my view. Still, there’s something about the fact that I’m almost naked and he’s fully dressed that’s hot. As I struggle to process the sensations of his unfettered access to my breasts, my mind serves me up something Katrin said after she helped me complete my questionnaire: I hate to be the one to break it to you, honey, but you’re a hell of a lot more into being dominated than you think you are. I didn’t think much of it at the time—it’s honestly not really an area I’ve explored in my past relationships, and the kind of things people presumably get up to at Alchemy scares me more than anything else—but now I urge myself to lean into it. If I think about it too much, this power dynamic is terrifying. This super-rich guy who gets everything he wants—and wanted me—has me locked in a room with him, and he’s paying an outrageous sum of money for the privilege of restraining me and touching me. I hate myself for thinking it, for being so predictable, but it’s freaking hot. All week, I’ve been practicing in my mind how I’d be: aloof and in control. I wouldn’t cry; I wouldn’t let him see how terrified I was either, and I definitely wouldn’t come. He’d unravel, and I would not. I’d do my best to please him yet remain unaffected. It seemed like the best course of action. But now I’m here, trussed up and bent over, and he’s playing with my body as if he’s never felt breasts before, and fuuuuck, every pinch of my sensitized nipples has shock waves careening through my body. Shit. I blow out a shaky breath. “More than ‘okay’?” he asks, sounding horribly smug. “Uh-huh,” I manage. He chuckles, then loosens his grip on my breasts, and I feel instantly bereft. “I have to say, I didn’t expect you to be quite so responsive.” He cups my breasts lightly, moving his hands just enough for his palms to graze my nipples and nothing more. It’s the worst. I huff out a frustrated sigh and arch my back, seeking friction. He chuckles again, soft and low, before tutting. “Who’d have thought it—the little ice queen behind the bar was just begging to have her tits played with by someone who knew what he was doing. And if I were to suck them...” “Oh, God,” I whisper to myself in response. He gets easily to his knees, his hair brushing the underside of my restrained arm, then a shock of wet warmth envelopes my nipple before he pulls it into his mouth and sucks de eply.
Oh shit. Oh fuck. I can actually feel the wetness soaking through my thong. This time, I shudder out a pitiful kind of cry that I instantly despise myself for. He scoots onto his ass, facing away from me. I can make out the bumps of his spinal column through his shirt as he proceeds to work my breasts harder, alternating with his hands and mouth, pulling my nipples down with his decadent sucks, his hair teasing my skin as he switches from one breast to another. He runs a hand lightly down over the skin of my lower stomach, just below where the leather support is cutting into me, and then it’s grazing over the lace covering my pubic bone and brushing between my legs where it’s wet and throbbing and aching for his attention. “Jesus, Elyse”—he pauses to run a leisurely tongue around my nipple —“I thought you’d at least make me work a bit harder. You’re fucking soaked. Very disappointing.” “I’m—sorry,” I shudder out, his words landing exactly where he intends them. Shame rolls over me in a hot, humiliating wave. “Disappointing for you, I mean.” He strokes just to one side of the lace between my legs, and it’s almost unbearable. “I imagine you were hoping to retain a little more self-respect, Little Miss I-Never-Go-Upstairs. Now you’ll be reduced to begging. I, on the other hand, am hard as a rock.” Oh my God, he is insufferable. A new wave of fear hits me, even as my pussy threatens to burst into flames. I’ve been so terrified that he might push me too hard that it never occurred to me that he might not push me hard enough. Is this how the guy who has everything he wants gets his kicks? By denying women what they want? “Orgasm denial is on my list of limits,” I choke out, widening my legs as if in hope. I actually thought Katrin was insane to make me check it, but now I’m so relieved I could cry. If I weren’t so frustrated, that is. He outright laughs and scoots out the other side of me, standing up and walking toward my rear. “Oh, baby, you don’t need to worry about that. Letting you come will bring me even more pleasure than letting myself come, but it’s knowing how much you’ll despise yourself that’ll be the icing on the cake. Feel how hard you’re making me, you exquisite little thing?” With that, he grips my hips hard and thrusts against me. Oh, holy shit. His dress pants brush against my ass cheeks as the hot hardness of his erection presses exactly where I need it. “Yes,” I hiss, and we both know it’s not in answer to his question. He arches over me, ke eping his dick right where it is, and I can feel his body heat through his shirt as he squeezes my breasts again. Right now, there’s a real risk of my passing out before we get to the good bit. Every erogenous zone in my body is pulsing, as if all my nerve endings know they’re being played by a maestro. He stays like that for a moment or two, dry-humping me from behind and playing with my breasts as I wriggle in my restraints like a kitten, grinding my ass against him as best I can. “Stop that,” he says, straightening up and delivering a sharp smack to my ass that has me going instantly still with shock. It’s still stinging when he gets to his knees behind me. “I call the shots,” he says, his breath warm on my most sensitive parts.
“Remember that, and we’ll both walk away very happy. Fuck, this ass is delectable.” He smooths over the area that he’s just slapped and bites my cheek as if it’s a peach while stroking his hand over the other cheek. “Now, let me see what I’ve paid for. Hmm.” The hum comes as he peels my thong slowly, slowly, down over my ass and then my legs. It’s the part I’ve been dreading the most, and I never imagined he’d do it with his face right there, but right now I’m the most shameless, wanton version of myself that has ever existed, and the sensation of the lace dragging downward is like freedom. He taps me on one ankle to suggest I st ep out of it, doing the same to the other, and then I really am one hundred percent bare for him, bent over and completely at his mercy. I can sense that he pulled away slightly to untangle my thong from my ankles. Now his hands trace up my legs, his fingers skimming my inner thighs, and he parts me right there, pulling me wide open far more forcibly than the way he touched my legs. Everything aches. Everything is on fire. My clit must be pulsing like you see open hearts do in those medical dramas. “I could do anything to you right now,” he muses. “Tongue, fingers, dick. Dildo. I could drive you crazy.” “Yeah,” I agree, close to sobbing. He readjusts his grip on me and taps a finger against my clit —“Perfect”—before running it up to circle my entrance. He pushes gently. “So fucking wet. Can you feel it?” “Uh-huh.” He pushes his finger the whole way in, and I want to die with happiness. He sucks in a harsh breath. “Fuck, that’s tight. So wet, though.” I can tell from the warmth of his breath on my flesh that his face must be right there. “The question is, can you take another?” “Yes?” I ask, and he laughs. I’m growing addicted to making him laugh. “That’s the spirit. And for that...” My reward is his tongue swirling over my clit, and I really am going to die now. It’s soft and luxurious and perfect. He definitely doesn’t need to do this—he’s paying me, after all—but then he groans decadently against me, and it’s the best sound I’ve ever heard. He sounds ravenous. Once again, he adjusts the way he’s holding me, stretching me as wide as he can—“So fucking slippery”—and puts his tongue back on me right as he pushes another finger inside of me. The stretch means my clit is entirely available to him and perfectly exposed to his devastating tongue. I let out some kind of awful wail before clamping my lips together in mortification. I am not going to survive this. He twists his fingers and gives me another lave of his tongue. “Jesus fucking Christ, I could do this all night long,” he says with the rasp of a man in pain. “Next time, I’m going to put you in fucking stirrups and eat you for hours and hours.” I studiously ignore the alarm bells that next time and stirrups should ring and moan my appreciation for that suggestion. “What has you so hot, I wonder?” Lick. Twist. “Does being paid turn you on? Or is it knowing I could have had any woman I wanted but I was so fucking desperate to stick my face in your pretty little cunt that I had to
make it so you couldn’t refuse?” Another hot rhetorical question I assume— but he pauses. “I’m waiting.” As if to underscore his point, he slowly drags his fingers out of me. “Uh, that. Just—you. This. Oh my God.” Not my most articulate moment, but I’m not in a place to analyze this. All the blood in my brain is swelling my clit to the size of a golf ball right now. “Yeah.” His voice grows softer as he slides his fingers back inside me and I clench around them like the greedy-ass ho that I apparently am. “Me too. You have the most perfect cunt I’ve ever seen. So pink. So soft. Men would do very bad things for a chance to taste it. And they’d maim and kill to stick their dicks inside it, that’s for sure.” With that ominous proclamation, he clamps his mouth to my clit. I’m expecting him to draw it out, tease me, make me beg like he threatened, but he fucking goes for it, licking and sucking while driving his long, thick fingers into my pussy over and over. It’s the most perfect kind of onslaught and one I am powerless to withstand. The urge to come grows unbearable within seconds. Every inch of my skin is covered in goosebumps. My nipples are tingling. And the waves of molten heat coursing over my entire pussy, inside and out, are out of control. His fingers and mouth are hitting everywhere I need them to. Everywhere. I can tell by his jerky movements that he’s losing control, too, and that knowledge, that Sinclair fucking Voss is feasting on me and losing his goddamn mind, has my arousal ramping up impossibly further. I’m out of my mind, too, with this need for release. My neck is aching from my efforts not to put too much weight on my throat, my arms are growing stiff, and my legs? My legs are shaking so hard they’d definitely collapse if not for the support under my stomach. I’m trapped like this, and it means there’s no outlet for all this crazy energy. It means I have to stand here and take this relentless assault from his mouth and his hands, and all of that makes the sensation so much more potent, more concentrated. Angels are singing. I feel feverish. My only outlets are pushing my pussy back into his face as fully as I can and giving in to the necessity of using my voice. My moans turn to full-on cries now as my climax hurtles toward me like a freight train. I’m talking gibberish, twisting my head uselessly from side to side, flapping my hands in their primitive restraints. “Please,” I say. “Please, I beg you. Harder. I can’t—Oh my God. Shit. I can’t. Fuck, I’m —” Just like that, my orgasm slams into me. I am a rock slingshotted into outer fucking space. It’s heaven. It’s like nothing I’ve ever felt in my life. I am air and fire; I am pure oxygen ignited. Wave after atomic wave ripples over me thanks to Sinclair’s relentless tongue, and as they begin to soften, I find myself utterly spent, a rag doll, my arms and legs floppy. He withdraws his fingers and drags them wetly down over my well-used clit. “I hope you can stay standing for a few more minutes,” he drawls, sounding out of breath but more self-satisfied than ever, “because it’s my turn now.”