Master (10 page)

Anna stirred in her seat. "So you mean you'll scene at
home in private? And you don't mind her doing stuff with other people and not
you?" Her voice wavered.
Damn it,
why do I sound like a stupid kid?

Lizzie gave her a quick glance before she concentrated on
the road again. "Do I turn here?"

"Yeah, and then down the first lane
on the left.
It's the first house you come to."

Lizzie indicated and followed the directions. "So,
scene-
ing
?" she said as she slowed to take a
tight curve and pull into Anna's driveway. "Well, we don't call it that,
but I suppose it is. We just do what's right for us. Fiona is brilliant at wax
play. She's a great teacher and a brilliant
Domme
.
Other people deserve to see what wax play by the right person is like."

She stopped the car, switched off the engine, and swiveled
in her seat to stare at Anna. Her blue eyes glistened in the light of the
security lamps outside the house. "She comes home to me, Anna, only me.
She might flog someone in a scene, but she doesn't fuck them. I'm the only
person she's intimate with. Look on it like going to work. You do your job, and
you interact as and how the job demands. Then you go home to your partner. End
of."

In a strange way, the words made sense. Anna opened the car
door. She'd got one hell of a lot to think about. She ran her fingers through
her hair and winced at the knots in it.
So much for trying to
remain tidy and composed.
She bet she looked like she'd been in a force
ten gale. Impatient with herself, Anna tucked a few errant strands behind her
ear. For two pins she'd cut it short. Leaving it long for all these years
because
Caden
liked it that way was stupid. She had
to move into a 'what I like' mode and put herself first.

But I don't want to.
The words resounded inside
her head, and Anna hoped she hadn't spoken them out loud. She shook her head,
and her hair tickled her cheek.
Definitely at least a trim needed.

Lizzie walked around the car and touched Anna's arm.

"Are you okay now,
hon
? You
look sort of grey. I didn't think my driving was that
bad.
Hell, don't tell Fiona or my ass will be red raw and I'll be sitting on a
rubber ring for a week." She giggled to show the scenario didn't
particularly perturb her.

A deep bark could be heard from inside the house. Anna took
out her door key.

"It wasn't your driving. Come on in and we'll have a
coffee and something to eat whilst you wait for Fiona."

 
The barking grew
louder, and Lizzie raised her eyebrows.

Anna giggled.
"Time to meet Dickens.
I've a feeling you've just helped me more than you'll ever know."

****

Cade
stood by the window of the
penthouse and sipped
a single
malt as he watched the
cars on the expressway. He'd bet they were all normal folks going about their
business with their lovers and friends, not beating themselves up over how they'd
fucked up big time.

Define normal. One person's
normal is the next person's kink.
He remembered the rhyme Daisy had made into a cross-stitch
picture for him.
Everyone's different. My
kink isn't your kink, and your kink isn’t mine. If it's safe, sane, and
consensual, then everything is fine.
 
But it wasn't.

 
Even a superb demo
and tutorial hadn't lifted his black mood. Once he'd given Connie her
aftercare,
Cade
had spent the bare minimum of time
possible talking to people before he excused himself and left.

Now as he glared at the view out of the window, he wondered
what he was going to do next. Ditch the penthouse and go back south until his
next visit to
Dommissima
? Some people would tell him
to accept what Anna said, cut his losses, and move on. But
Caden
wasn't some people, and he wanted Anna, even if it was just once more he
wanted—no, needed—to feel his cock buried deep inside her pussy. Experience the
exquisite sensation as she held him tight and milked him until his prick ached.

He'd made arrangements for
Serendip
,
his own club, to run smoothly whilst he was away. In fact, he thought as he
finished the whisky in one swallow and rinsed his glass, they didn't need him
at all.

Caden
,
shut up, grow up, and stop wallowing.
He picked up the phone and called Daisy.
Ten minutes later he was chuckling. Daisy never minced her words, and he had
been, he realized, thoroughly chastised. The expressions, 'stop being a Jessie,
and grow a set' had been her words of wisdom. She was right, he decided. It was
up to Anna to make the next move. Hanging around in
Glasgow
wasn't going to make her miraculously
change her mind and be on her knees begging to be his sub. If she found out he
was still around, he reasoned Anna would be more likely to report him for
harassment. In the most positive frame of mind he'd had for ages,
Cade
took himself off to bed. Tomorrow he was going south
once more. He didn't examine his reasons for booking a flight and leaving his
car in the underground garage. Even when the flight was delayed for technical
reasons,
Caden
kept his cool. Why he was so unworried
about the future he had no idea, but
Cade
wasn't
going to buck the trend to examine his feelings. Instead, once he was home and
checked all was fine at
Serendip
, he set to and
redecorated his house. Out went the cool and he admitted unfriendly
furnishings, and in came things that he realized reflected Anna. They were
also, he decided, a truer reflection of his personality. In the best frame of
mind he'd had for months, he stripped wallpaper, painted doors, and spent more
time in home ware shops than he'd ever done before or wanted to do again. At
the end of a week he was satisfied. He'd created a home, not just somewhere to
live.

****

Daisy stared at him for so long
Caden
wriggled and then held his hands out in supplication.

"Why do I feel like a minnow in a jam jar?"

She shrugged. "I've no idea,
Caden
.
Why do you?
 
Guilty
conscience, maybe?"

It was so close to the truth that he rolled his eyes.
"Yeah, could be. Oh hell, Daisy, I'm trying to be patient, and it
ain't
easy. Should I just give in? Let her go and forget
everything, or fight for what and who I love?"

 
"Well, you
didn't know anything about her for years,
Cade
, so
who knows? Sometimes I wish I'd never gone up there and recognized her. Then
you'd not have had all this stress. But on the other side, at least you can
move on now one way or the other. How did you leave things?"

 
Cade
had told her about the night in
Dommissima
. He didn't
have a lot of secrets from Daisy.

"God knows, to be honest. The last thing she said was
publish her picture and be damned."

"Will you?"

He shook his head.
"Oh no.
Even though in theory she still has a week left to come and get it, she won't,
and I won't publish. It's one thing having it in here, another to show it to
all and sundry. Here it's only a few people who see it. Really it's only up on
the wall for me. To look at and remember how fucking gorgeous she looked.
And how amazing our lovemaking was after."
His voice
trailed off.

 
"And?"

"And how soon after that she left. I guess it was the
last straw for her. Just after that we went public. I was so proud to demo with
her, to show people how bloody gorgeous she looked and as I thought, what a
perfect sub she was. I was in cloud cuckoo land. God, I was so arrogant and so
sure of myself. It seems she hated it, and I ignored her. So rather than talk,
she went. Now, well now, I guess nothing has changed. Except I have to accept
that my lovely Anna has an equal right to what she wants. If that includes the
fact she doesn't want to talk or negotiate, so be it." He smiled as he
remembered her face in
Dommissima
. "Hell, Daisy,
I've never seen anyone so green and still stand. My brave lady was doing so
until I pushed her too far. If nothing else it made me
realize
that I'd done her a disservice, and not listened. Fine Dom I was. Shit, I hope
I'm not so self-centered now."

"Ah,
Cade
."
Daisy hugged him.
"You're the most fair and loyal Master I know. You were blinkered with
Anna and thought with your heart not your mind, I'm sure of it. Oh, I'm not
blaming either of you," she added hastily. "It happens. It'll sort
itself out. Right, now you're back, can we get things rolling?" She let go
of him and perched on the edge of his desk, her foot swinging. As usual she was
barefoot.

Cade
chuckled and tickled her
toes. Daisy squirmed and batted his hand away. "Give over. So are you
ready to start work?"

"So you're not counting last week then?"

"Nah, your body might have been here, your mind sure as
hell wasn't. I asked you if you wanted to host the
Shibari
evening on the 15
^th
and you said duck egg blue. I asked you to get
me a sandwich for lunch on Friday, and you came in with sushi. I hate sushi,
and you know it. Then when I said I didn't want it you just looked blank and
threw it in the bin and yours along side it. You love sushi. I nipped out and
got a packet of crisps and an apple. You ate the apple and offered me the
crisps. So, yes, I reckon we ignore last week."

 
She had a point.

"We ignore last week," he agreed. "Okay, so,
let Master Felix host the
Shibari
evening, and I'll
spring you lunch.
Anything else?"

"Yeah, you've been booked for a series of private
lessons starting in two weeks. I've done all the checks, and your pupil-to-be
has passed them all with flying colors."

 
"Hmm?"
Cade
couldn't get enthusiastic. So much for the wake
up smell the coffee and move on attitude he intended to have. It seemed to have
deserted him. "Okay, who is it, male or female, and what am I
teaching?"

"
Female,
and how to be a good
sub. Don't
worry,
I'll sort everything out with you
nearer the time. Now you
gonna
show me this duck egg
blue whatever that was more important than hosting the
Shibari
evening?"

He took the hint. "Come on, let's go look. And I'll
feed you and let you have the afternoon off. Merry and Stuart can hold the
fort. I'll do tonight."

Daisy jumped down from the desktop and looked around the
room. "Great, I just need to find my shoes. What pair am I wearing?"

Cade
shook his head in mock
despair. "You're not. That's why you need to find them."

"Funny man.
You know what I mean.
Ah ha."
She ducked under her desk, and her purple clad
bum stuck up in the air as she bent double.

Cade
chuckled. "Nice
ass."

Daisy stood up again and waved a pair of four-inch
stiletto-heeled boots at him. Her face was flushed.
Cade
reckoned it was from bending over not from embarrassment at his comment. He was
right. She rolled her eyes and stuck one finger in the air.

"Nice ass? Yes, you are. Let's go."

 
As a retort he
decided it couldn't be bettered.
Cade
followed her
out of the room.

Chapter Eight

Okay, now I've got one chance.

Until that moment, Anna would have laughed if she'd been
told the air was heavy or expectant. She'd have rolled her eyes at the speaker
and told them not to be fanciful. Not now however. She understood what it meant
all too well. The family of spiders that lived under her garden shed floor had
taken up residence in her tummy and was jostling for position. Those that
couldn't get in were vying with the army of ants that crawled over her body and
made her skin too tight for her skeleton. In a word, Anna was scared.

"For goodness’ sake, hon." Fiona cuddled her as
Lizzie arranged a pile of cushions on the floor and sat down. "We're not
having an orgy here, you know. It's a bottle of wine and a pizza. The only
ropes are those on the ends of the sofa."

 
Anna giggled and
tried a smile. "I often wonder what those sofa builders had in mind when
they tied the sides to the back like that."

Lizzie looked up from the floor.
"Probably
not what we have."