Hard Lessons (3 page)

“I see you’ve been crying. I’m guessing you found that hard, little sub. Am I right?”

I can only nod. ‘Hard’ doesn’t even come close.

“Still, you did well. I’m very pleased with you. This last bit with your pretty lilac paddle won’t take long then we’re done with all this. Can you stand?”

I shake my head. There’s no way my legs are moving of their own volition any time soon. He chuckles, the sound warm, comforting, like a favorite blanket. “No problem, take your time. Just stretch, lie still for a few minutes, let the blood start flowing again. Did you say your wristbands were in your bag? I’ll go fetch them for you.”

He drops another light kiss onto my mouth and stands up, heading once more for the door. And I hit meltdown. I know, with absolute, total and chilling certainty that he can’t go. I can’t let him leave me again. Not now, maybe not ever. I finally succumb to the gnawing panic that has threatened to drown me for hours now, ever since he first said he was leaving. I’ve held myself together, just about, but no more. No more.

My spine gives way, just stops holding me up, and I crumble, collapsing in silence to the floor. I need him to stop, to look back, to turn. In desperation I grasp the lilac paddle, wrapping my fist around the handle and I use the butt to rap sharply on the floor, twice, the sound reverberating around the room. I’m signing, my subconscious taking over as the phrase “don’t leave me” is framed repeatedly by my hands.

He’s back in an instant, his arms around me as he gathers me up from the floor, his back against the pillar as he cradles me. And I’m sobbing, great gulping, voiceless sobs as I grasp at his T-shirt, wrapping myself around him, crawling all over him in my desperation to connect and to stay connected, to never let him go again. His arms tighten in response, holding me close, then closer still as he picks up on what I’m needing, what I’m craving. He rocks me, offering comfort and safety, and I grasp at it, at him, my lifeline.

I have no idea how long we stay like that, my naked, trembling body draped across his as I hang on as though my life depends on it. Maybe it does. Eventually my sobs subside, coherent thought starts to return, and I can make sense of his soft voice murmuring in my ear.

“You’re safe, baby. I have you. I have you…” The words are on a loop, repeated over and over.

Eventually I hear, and believe, and respond. Eventually I calm. When he senses that I can hear him, can think straight again, he cups my chin, lifting my face gently, urging me to look into his eyes once more. It’s almost unbearable, the emotion so raw now, my recent pain so debilitating, so crippling that I don’t want to face it. But I have to. He insists, and I have started to learn obedience.

“Tell me.”

The words are softly whispered, but it’s my Dom speaking all the same, and I know there’s no hiding place. But not yet, not just yet. I turn my face to bury it in his chest, and he allows that. For now. He continues to hold me, his palm massaging my back, that space between my shoulder blades that calms and comforts. And he waits. He waits for me to tell him.

I’m sitting on the floor now, my back against the central pillar, facing him as I sign the words. “I thought you were never going to come back for me.” And I’m embarrassed at how ridiculous my fears now seem. He told me he was coming back—I had only to trust him, to believe him. I had only to wait.

He apparently thinks so too. “Why? Why would you think that, Freya?”

“Because it always happens that way. People I love disappear. They leave me and never come back. My parents did. So did my gran. And now Summer.” My hands are flying, I keep forgetting he’s a novice at signing.

He reaches out, clasps my hands to still them. “I got some of that, but you need to slow down, please. You said something about ‘always’ and mentioned your family. Sign it again, but remember I’m only a learner.”

Mercifully at least he didn’t pick up on the ‘L’ word that I had somehow managed to let slip in there. I need to be more circumspect—he’ll dump me like a hot brick if he senses that there’s more to this than a simple training contract. Using slow, stilted, careful signing I repeat what I first told him. Well, most of it. And in response to his gentle, probing questions I go on to tell him about my parents, about my gran’s death, and about how I came to live with Margaret. And that goes some way toward explaining why being left alone terrified me to such an extent that I was reduced to the quivering mess that he just scooped up from his dungeon floor. But only some of the way—I’m sure there must be more, I just don’t understand it myself yet.

“Has this ever happened before? You live alone normally, don’t you?”

I nod. In fairness, although being alone is not particularly my preferred state, I find it perfectly bearable as a rule. Apart from when Summer’s in residence I live alone more through circumstance than choice, and I prefer to think of it as solitude rather than loneliness. Certainly I’ve never before experienced such an overwhelming, all-consuming sense of panic at finding myself alone. But this time I did, and I’m as surprised as Nick Hardisty at my reaction. This truly is a voyage of discovery.

“That was awful. Just plain awful.” A thought occurs to me, a horrible thought. I have to ask, this could change everything. Nervous, I sign my next question, “Is that how you’ll punish me if I mess up again? Now that you know how much I hate it?” I stop, hesitate, then sign the rest, “I don’t think I can bear it if you do.”

He reaches for my hands, taking both of them between his and holding them still, the equivalent of a hand gently covering a mouth. “No, Freya, I won’t. Being a submissive is not about exposing your vulnerabilities so that a Dom can exploit them. Quite the opposite in fact. It’s my job to help you feel stronger, more confident, and to push your boundaries. Discipline is a large part of it, and I intended you to feel bored, frustrated, nervous, uncomfortable. Scared possibly in anticipation of being beaten with a paddle again. I did not set out intending to distress you like this, and as soon as I saw that you weren’t handling it I came back.” He stops, his gray gaze warm now, a slight smile quirking his gorgeous lips. “Remember, I said that discipline has to be proportionate and fair if it’s to work? How pissed off with you do you imagine I’d have to be to even come close to wanting to repeat this? To intentionally make you feel like this again?”

I’m puzzled, baffled by his words. He was gone hours, he must have intended me to be upset. He must have. And what does he mean, ‘as soon as I saw?’ How did he see when he wasn’t here? My face must be betraying at least some of my questions because he points to the ceiling, just over the door. “Look up there, Freya. A camera. And another in the opposite corner. I was watching you the whole time. I could see that you were on edge, right from the start, but you were coping. Then your breathing became really erratic in the final couple of minutes you were on your own, and you were shaking. The start of a panic attack. So I came back early.”

Cameras? Early?
My head’s reeling. He was here all the time, sort of. I was never really alone.
Oh Christ.

Relief turns to anger, and I forget my submissive status and round on him.

“You were gone for hours. And I was so frightened. If you were watching you must have seen that,” my hands are flying once more in rapid fire signing. Luckily for me perhaps I’ve never found a need to swear in sign. Not until now, anyway. I suspect I may need to widen my vocabulary around Nick Hardisty. If I dare. Or maybe it’d be simpler just to punch him on the jaw. There’s a lot more I’d like to say but I settle for that, my expression now nothing short of mutinous. So much for submissive obedience.

He looks at me long and hard, and I begin to fear my little outburst won’t go unpunished. Then, “I was gone forty-five minutes, that’s all. I intended an hour, but cut it short.”

I stare at him, incredulous.
Forty-five minutes? No way!
It was more than that. Much, much more. “I don’t believe you.”

A flicker of anger shoots into his eyes, only to be quickly dispelled. Nick Hardisty is not used to having unruly subs accuse him of lying, but maybe he’ll make an exception on this occasion. I have to hope so, because I seem incapable of controlling what I say just now.

“I arrived home just after three. We talked a while in the kitchen, and you came into the dungeon at about three thirty. Agreed?” His tone is calm, reasonable, as he elaborates, taking the time and trouble to convince me.

I nod.

“So, what time do you think it is now?”

I shrug, think about that for a few seconds. I lost count of the hours that inched past achingly slow as I knelt alone on that bloody mat of his, but it was several. I know it was. I make a guess at four or five, which would make the time now around eight or maybe nine in the evening. I sign that to him.

His response is to pull his phone out of his jeans pocket and turn it on. He hands it to me, the home screen glowing brightly, and proclaiming the time to be sixteen thirty-two. Only just after half past four in the afternoon. I just stare at the screen, the proof positive that I’m losing it, that I somehow made a few minutes seem like hours in my mind, that I was so convinced of it, so absolutely certain. That I let myself get into a state of near collapse by being made to sit still for three-quarters of an hour.

I feel the blood drain from my face as Nick gently removes the phone from my nerveless fingers and pockets it once more. He reaches for me, picking me up effortlessly as he takes my place leaning against the pillar and settles me on his lap. “It was a mind-fuck, love, that’s all. And it’s done with now. Finished. No more, I promise.”

His breath is against my ear as he whispers the words, and at last I accept that he’s telling me the truth.

Long minutes pass as we sit still, me snuggled up on my Dom’s lap, regrouping, gathering my wits once more. I’m well aware that my punishment is not yet complete, but Nick seems in no particular hurry to lay me across the spanking bench. Eventually I’m the one to break the mood as I lean away, stretching to reach the paddle still lying discarded on the floor close to the mat, where I dropped it after my outburst. He smiles as I hand it to him, ready now to finish, and above all desperate to move on.

“You got more back then than either of us bargained for. I’m ready to call it quits.”

I turn to him, surprised. Dom’s might occasionally reduce a punishment, but they never fail to deliver one, once it’s been earned. And despite everything that’s happened this afternoon, I find I don’t want him to. I deserve this beating, it’ll even the scales between us, and once it’s finished he’ll accept my apology and it’ll be behind us. I need that—nothing less will do.

I frown, shoving the paddle at him. He grins at me as he takes it, understanding my needs perfectly.

“Proper little pain freak you’re turning out to be. Okay then, if you insist.” He shoves himself to his feet, taking me with him. I stumble slightly as my feet hit the floor, and he steadies me. “Are you sure you’re okay? You don’t have to do this.”

I nod sharply and step out of his arms in the direction of the bench. I reach it then look back at him in inquiry.

He shakes his head at my perseverance, his smile wry as he issues his instructions. “Lie lengthways along the top, just as you did that first night at the club. I want to be able to see your hands so fold your arms above your head.”

I do as I’m told, quivering slightly in anticipation as I watch him approach, stand behind me, the paddle loosely swinging from his powerful right hand. I remember what he told me, about being able to make me safe word within three strokes if he chooses to, but I’m not afraid of him. Or of this.

“Would you like me to prepare you first?”

I nod, thankful that he remembered.

“Okay. For this, I want you to relax into the bench, let it absorb the strokes. Remember to breathe slowly, breathe in between the strokes and out after each one. You’re not wearing your wristbands, so if you want me to stop you just slap the top of the bench, twice, sharply. So, are you ready to start?”

I nod, and brace myself. And wait. At last he speaks to me again.

“What did I tell you about breathing? You’re holding your breath, Freya. Breathe out, now.”

I do, and he instructs me to breathe in. Then out again. In, out, until my breathing is slow, steady, controlled. And I really am ready.

The first blow is exquisite, the pain across my left buttock sharp, crisp and clean. I breathe out, more of a sigh really, then draw my next breath, ready for his palm to fall again. It does, this time on the right side, and once more the sensation is glorious, the burn sweet and erotic. He repeats the action, alternating between my buttocks and managing to position the blow perfectly each time. I can feel the glow growing, blooming as my flesh absorbs the spanks, heating up under his hand. He increases the weight of his strokes, just slightly, just enough to maintain the shock but blending that with exhilaration, building the sharp tingle artfully as I writhe on the bench.

I’m reveling in this, and intuitive Dom that he is, he knows it, continuing to spank me long after the preparatory effects are exhausted. He ramps up the pressure again, very slightly, but it’s enough. It hurts, but it’s a good sort of hurting. It feels wonderful, exciting, beautifully erotic. I’m welcoming every blow, jerking under his hand as it falls and connects with my sensitized bottom, each resounding slap echoing around the room. I’m aware of the pain, attuned to it but at the same time becoming strangely disconnected from it as the sting radiates and disperses through my body. I experience a curious impression of floating, and can no longer feel the floor under my bare feet. I could fall, could roll off this bench so easily, but I really don’t care. All I care about, the only thing I’m aware of is the steady, rhythmic sound of the slaps, and the sublime mix of pleasure and pain now curling seductively through my body. I want more of it, I want all of it. I never want it to end. I want to soak it all in, soak it up.

I have no idea how long he continues to pleasure me with pain, how long I lie there, my body bared and vulnerable, accepting the sweet torment he’s lavishing on me so generously. But at last he slows, the blows become less frequent, lighter, eventually stopping altogether. And still I lie there, drifting in a hazy sort of semi-consciousness, my body sore and aching but incredibly relaxed.