Authors: Christina Crooks
Rough Play (6 page)
“Cold? Need your coat?” He offered it. “Or, I could turn up the room heat?”
She shook her head.
He looked at her closely for a moment, then nodded. “The St. Andrew’s Cross. A classic favorite.” Martin strode to it, tossed her coat onto a chair, then nonchalantly tightened a dangling black leather restraint onto his left wrist with one tug of the buckle. Then he looked at her. “You’ll have to assist.”
He really was going along with it. She closed her mouth. This was a perfect opportunity to question him about Gail in a manner he couldn’t escape or deflect. Or attack Charlotte physically due to a guilty reaction.
Not that she believed he’d attack her. Or even that it was likely he had anything to do with Gail’s disappearance. He was too busy running the club, and he just seemed too arrogant to be anything but honest. Too respected by others, and respectful to everyone, to be a woman beater.
He might just be a very good actor, she supposed. Not everyone’s inside matched their outside. She was proof enough of that.
She crossed into the velvet-roped area to the section of wood.
He laid his arm against the wood helpfully. He seemed utterly compliant, yet his presence electrified the very air around him. She frowned at him as a reminder she wasn’t to be trifled with.
She leaned in to enclose his wrist.
Without warning, his large hand snaked around her head and he pulled her lips to his.
His mouth took instant and firm possession of hers. The iron strength of his hand contrasted deliciously with his lips, firm one moment and soft the next, fitting to her own lips perfectly. He kissed her skillfully, teasing the surface with sensation and heat. When he forced her mouth open with his thrusting tongue she couldn’t stop the full-body response shooting through her, mouth to nipples to pussy.
His breath tasted like the rest of him smelled. Sweet and woodsy. She wanted to taste everything on him. She wanted to touch all of him.
He ended the kiss. It left her weak and confused. She found herself lying against him, savoring the feel of his body.
“Not submissive? I’d say you’ve a fairly thick streak.”
It took all her strength to push herself away. She shoved his arm back against the wood with more force than strictly necessary, fastened him tightly.
“My ankles are still unsecured,” he said helpfully.
“I’m not interested in your ankles.” She felt her face heat after hearing the seductive sound of her own voice. She spoke with more harshness. “I’m not interested in anything about you except your answers.”
She bent, quickly secured his legs. His sturdy black leather boots had metal toe guards and wide, rugged lace holes. Too bulky. She had to wrap the restraints around his large calves instead. The restraints could barely close around them, but she wasn’t going to waste time taking off his boots. “Now you’ll have to talk.”
“The inquisitor has entered the building.”
“So be afraid,” she replied, unable to prevent a smile.
“You should realize you’d be more intimidating with some sort of weapon in your hand. A flogger. A cane, perhaps. There’s a collection over there, and a toy box in the corner.” He pointed with his chin.
“Are you always this . . .”
“Incorrigible?” He smiled at her. Pure innocence.
“Yeah.”
“I’ve never let myself be restrained on a St. Andrew’s Cross before.” He moved against it. “Ouch. Splinters.”
“Poor baby.” Then what he said registered. “You’ve never been restrained on one of these before? Bullshit. It’s the most common piece of S and M furniture.”
“Interesting how you know that.”
She remained silent.
Martin finally shrugged. “It’s true.” He looked her in the eyes. “You’re my first inquisitor. Be gentle with me.”
She turned her back on him. She went to the toy box.
Toys. Play. Was that what she was doing here? Playing? No. It was strategy, this inquisition.
She rested one hand on its red plastic. Her vision was strange, as if the heat in her body had risen to her eyes, making everything brighter.
She shook her head to clear the sudden fever, took a deep, cooling breath. And another, looking past the velvet ropes.
Then she wondered if a fever really had hit her. Was that Rollie? She blinked, staring. Impossible. Her coworker from Burger Town was here? And, Rollie was bald?
He must normally wear a wig. But recognition came from her coworker’s slender, almost girlish body, his hunched posture, his unmistakable peaches and cream complexion, his same tight mouth pursed in concentration even though he did nothing more than lounge against a wall, talking to Amethyst. He wore an outrageous cloak and drapey leggings instead of the blue polyester pants. And, bald.
How weird to see him in Subspace. He’d be shocked to see her, too. Probably terribly embarrassed. He’d have to explain his presence here. So would she.
Amethyst said something to him, and he glanced toward Charlotte.
Charlotte pulled her gaze from him, pretending to examine the stars on the ceiling. Then she stole a look.
Rollie was walking quickly away. Amethyst waved to her.
Charlotte exhaled. She waved back.
“Okay.” She muttered to herself. “He might not have seen me.” In the toy box she found a lightweight wooden paddle slightly longer than a hairbrush. Instead of bristles, it had several small round holes in the wood.
When Cory had first started insisting on running a Gorean household, he’d bought the St. Andrew’s Cross. Then he’d brought home other things: slave whips, snake whips, slave bracelets and shackles, electrical prods, cages, leashes, gags, hoods . . . and, of course, the slave brand.
She dropped the paddle back into the toy box, selected a long, red prod. It hummed when she pressed a button. Batterypowered zapper. She knew a little about this one.
Charlotte presented the prod, putting it before Martin’s gaze the way Cory had always first displayed his tools to her.
Martin’s stretched-out masculine form tempted her. She wanted to run her hands over it, caress it with tongue and teeth and lips. Not zap it with something Cory had called a slave prod.
But if Martin wanted to play this silly game and make her life difficult rather than simply answering her questions, she’d play. For Gail.
She pressed the button again, experimentally. She could tell he heard the buzz by the way his eyes flicked to the device. “I don’t want to do this,” she told him. “But I do have to question you, and you’d better be more open with me than you have been. Okay?”
“Sure thing.”
She scowled at his tone. “Martin, where did you last see Gail? Gail Luskind. She saw your dating site profile and made arrangements to meet you here at Subspace.”
She saw his reaction. Then his eyes hooded slightly. “How exactly is her dating or sex life any of your business?”
Her heart sank. He was avoiding the question. That was a bad sign. “I’m the one asking the questions.”
He closed his eyes in a long, slow blink. Now he appeared to be as relaxed as if he were stretched out on a warm, sandy beach rather than strapped to a wooden cross. “The woman called herself something else—I won’t compromise her privacy by telling you her scene name. She wasn’t at all what I’d expected. It’s people like her that make Internet dating aggravating. She was brief and charming online and on the phone. But she was completely differently in person.” He flicked his gaze to Charlotte. “I wouldn’t have taken the two of you for buddies. She’s shrill and pushy and shrewish. You’re very different . . . hmmm.”
Resisting the temptation to ask Martin what he considered different about her, Charlotte said, “So, you’ve met Gail. Did you hurt her? Where is she now?”
“Hurt her?” He stared at Charlotte with a frown. “I don’t believe so. But you’re not offering the proper incentive for me to talk.” He shifted, indolent. Challenging her.
Her gaze dropped involuntarily to the X of his body, to where his black pants would’ve made his penis size a mystery if the cross weren’t positioned directly under a light. The shadows made his facial features more craggy and dangerous, his muscles more defined, and his cock a small mountain.
He caught her glance. “I’m completely at your mercy,” he teased. “Do your worst.” He wiggled his hands, making the chains attached to the leather restraints rattle. “But I have to warn you, I won’t talk. I never kiss and tell.”
She lifted the prod. “You kissed her? What else did you do?”
“It’s just an expression.”
“So, did you kiss her?”
He remained silent.
“You think I won’t do this.” She made herself think of Gail, and how this smug man before her wouldn’t say what had happened to her. Or where she’d gone. Or whether or not he’d kissed her. “You’re wrong to think I won’t.” Before she could think about it too deeply, she made herself press the button and touch the prod to the exposed skin above his manacled wrist.
The pop of static electricity discharging made her jump. There was tiny puff of smoke. The smell of ozone filled her nostrils. The sound and scent brought memories of all the times Cory had disciplined her. How disappointed he’d been in her.
She found herself staring at the small, red welt on Martin’s forearm. She’d made that. She could make more. He couldn’t stop her.
It felt nice to be totally in control. Completely, 100 percent in charge. And yet . . .
Martin eyed the tiny welt. He sighed. “Is that all?” He still appeared completely relaxed. Maybe the electrical zap didn’t sting as much as she remembered.
“No.” She hoped she sounded fierce. “There’s more where that came from.” She stared at his muscles, his body.
She realized suddenly that she felt jealous of him. She wanted to switch places with Martin. She wanted him to torment and toy with her. She wanted him the way she’d once wanted Cory.
This was the correct man to take her brutally, like in her fantasies.
The movie said so.
How utterly annoying.
She quickly drew back Martin’s sleeve, exposing more of his flesh. “You started this. I’ll keep going as long as I have to. Please, just tell me where Gail went. Did you see her make a call? Did you see anything at all? I need to know.”
“I’m sorry. Subspace patrons expect privacy.”
“What are you hiding?” she demanded.
“Ah. Now you’re starting to sound more like her. Shrill. Bossy.” He grinned at Charlotte.
She felt her temper rise. “Fine.” She pressed the button, letting him hear the hum of power. She placed the tip of the prod on top of the welt she’d already made. This time he flinched slightly at the spark, but she steeled herself as the puff of ozone-scented air wafted up. She held the instrument still, then listened to the multiple pops as she drew it slowly up his arm. That had to hurt.
When she stopped, she viewed the dark pink line she’d drawn on his arm from wrist to elbow. It stood out against the dark ivory of the underside of his muscular forearm.
He flexed, and the welt shifted. The pink line looked suddenly small and insignificant. But he nodded, approving. “Nice work! I always wondered what that one felt like. Usually I work with canes, clamps, and the more advanced electrical toys. I’m afraid that tiny zapper has been gathering dust for a while.”
His praise gratified her, then, swiftly on the heels of the emotion, perplexed her. Tiny zapper? Did he think she was going easy on him?
Why should she care what he thought of her?
She flung the zapper toward the other toys.
He tsked. “Care for the equipment, little one. Treat toys gently. But you. You don’t want to be treated gently, do you.” It wasn’t a question.
“Don’t call me that.”
“What? ‘Little one’? But you are. I’m bigger and stronger than you, and you like that. Your body is so slender, so submissive. So eager to be overpowered in all the best ways.”
She started, feeling naked before him. He couldn’t know. The core of her clenched pleasurably in response to his strength even as her mind pondered the problem of it.
She glared at him. “Do I need a bigger stick with you?”
He smiled with honest good humor. His laughing eyes, the quick flash of even, white teeth transformed him into something handsome for a moment. She couldn’t miss his look of approval. “No, Charlotte. I just wanted to see you in action. You haven’t got a sadistic bone in your body. A submissive all the way through. One with special interests. Let’s switch places. I promise I’ll give you exactly what you crave.”
His gaze held hers calmly, in silent expectation. A predator waiting for its prey to offer itself up to him.
The tight, familiar knot within her begged for the kind of release he offered.
It would be the beginning of disaster.
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