Soul Rest: A Knights of the Board Room Novel (46 page)

Celeste blinked at the blatant exhibitionism, the abrupt and decisive way Lyda had taken control of things, turning this moment into an intimate one between her and her submissive. Celeste couldn’t move, yet she was sure Lyda would have sent her scampering if she hadn’t wanted an audience. But it wasn’t as if the Domme had sought one, either. The humming energy Celeste had felt since she’d stepped off the lift was fueled by her intuitive knowledge—and by the anticipation of the other submissives here—that the Doms could do as they wished, when they wished. Lyda had just taken that truth from an undercurrent to a full wave that swamped Celeste. She could feel the increased heat in the room. Or maybe that was just in and around herself.

It only took seconds before Gen lost the ability to respond to anyone but her Mistress, and only in panting breaths. Her head was back on Lyda’s shoulder as her Mistress stroked her pussy. Gen wasn’t wearing any underwear, obvious from the glimpses of flesh Lyda offered as she worked her hand under Gen’s skirt. Her scarlet-tipped fingers slid inside and Gen went onto her toes, straining as Lyda fucked her slowly, her knuckles coming out glistening.

Lyda’s keen gray gaze rose. “Do you like to watch, Celeste?”

She must, because she couldn’t look away. Her own lips were parted, her body swept with sensations that made her sway on her heels. Gen twitched, a cry slipping out of her lips as Lyda did something with her fingers. Lyda shifted her grip to Gen’s throat. With one hand there and the other between Gen’s legs, it reminded Celeste suddenly of a cello, the way Lyda held her, played her sub’s body, her own latex clad legs spread out and braced to balance Gen against her.

“She was already hot and slippery on her way here,” Lyda said conversationally, keeping her eyes on Celeste. Gen’s heels lifted out of her sexy black pumps. “Mistress…” she gasped.

“Mm-hmm. You’re going to come in front of your friend, Gen. Right…now.”

Celeste’s fingers closed in nervous reaction as Gen obeyed, her body bucking against Lyda’s hold. The woman was strong, moving with her sub and yet holding her upright. When Gen’s legs buckled, Celeste was ready to move forward, but as smooth as a rippling wind, Noah was there, dropping to one knee and closing his hands on Gen’s thighs, helping to hold her upright. Since he wore nothing but the black dress slacks that rode low on his hips, Celeste saw the tattoo between his shoulder blades. It was a blood-colored heart with a Celtic triquetra overlay done in black. Below it was the infinity sign, the sideways figure eight, etched artistically inside a rendering of handcuffs. Below that was script.
Yours, conditionally.
A jagged scar bifurcated the two intriguing words.

He offered Celeste a cordial glance before he bent and placed his lips on Gen’s thigh. When he licked the trail of release off that pale column, Celeste glimpsed a tongue stud.

“That’s my sweet rabbit.” Lyda nuzzled Gen’s throat, her cheek. She shifted her hand from between her sub’s legs to offer her fingers to Noah. He licked Gen’s release off of them, then produced a handkerchief from his slacks pocket to dry his Mistress’s fingers. When he released her, Lyda ran a fingertip along the side of his face. “I promised Marcie a whip demonstration at the reception, Noah.”

“That probably disturbed some of the guests,” he commented, a twinkle in his eyes. “Sorry I missed it.”

She tugged his hair. “At the reception, I promised Marcie a whip demonstration. Young fool. Grammar nazi. You’ll oblige when they get here?”

“You never have to ask, Mistress.” He rose then, putting his arms around Gen to support her on that side. Gen looked a little dazed and, when he captured her mouth in a heated kiss, she uttered a noise of pleasure, making him hold her tighter. Watching the three of them together was too much. Celeste needed Leland, now, no matter what the rules were about mingling until the damn Doms were ready.

Fortunately, the overhead lights began to dim, leaving spotlights on the main pieces of equipment and creating plenty of shadows. The music, a haunting, seductive playlist, drifted to silence. Somebody had uncapped their bubbles, because a small cadre of them floated by.

As conversation started to fade, Noah lifted his head and met Celeste’s gaze, a light smile playing on his lips. “I think someone is looking for you,” he whispered. Then he bent, lifted Gen in his arms and followed his Mistress toward the equipment.

Rachel had said the Doms would make their move when they were ready to get down to business, and that seemed to be the case. Celeste noticed other Doms and subs drifting in the same direction as Noah, Gen and Lyda. Those who preferred voyeurism or a different kind of play melted toward the places where chairs and beds waited.

She wanted to watch as well, but she didn’t want to do it alone. She knew Leland was still at the bar. She felt his presence like the sun at the center of the galaxy. When she turned to see him leaning there, his eyes were fixed on her in a way she was beginning to understand and answer how they both wanted. As she moved across the room, the sensual atmosphere kept a firm grip on her, so that she moved in the sexy dress the way its designers had intended, her hips swaying, her posture straight. Her high heels gave her a pendulum walk. The gleam of the sheer stockings enhanced her legs. She was keenly aware of how every curve of her body was on display for him.

He didn’t move, just devoured her with his eyes, more so with every step she made toward him. His lips stayed firm and unsmiling, his gaze intent. When she reached him, she didn’t think. She acted on pure desire and intuition. She sank to her knees at his feet.

His gaze turned to flame. She kept her head up, her eyes meeting his, wanting to see what he wanted, needed.

He set aside his drink. For a time he just studied her, intensifying her arousal. Her heart was a deep drum thud inside her body, echoing throughout every cavity. When at last he reached out and touched her lips, she parted them with an erotic sigh. Ecstasy jolted through her from that simple touch. Watching her, stroking her mouth, he fished ice out of his glass to trace over that same path, then lower, nestling the ice in her cleavage. He left it there, leaving it to melt and work its way down her body under the dress as he ran another piece over the curve of one breast, up her throat. She tipped back her head at the unspoken demand and he put the ice in her mouth, watched her suck on it, melt it on her tongue. The ice melting in her cleavage was fire and cold, making her want to squirm, but she didn’t. When it melted enough to drop down into her lap under her skirt, it stayed there a few excruciating seconds before it slid down between her thighs, tumbling against the crotch of her panties, then dropping to the floor between her folded calves.

“Give me your hand.”

He lifted her to her feet, turning her to face the room. As he did, he leaned her back against him. She rotated her ass against his erection, steel against the fly of his black jeans.

“Nice. Keep doing that.” He slid his hands up and down her arms, played with her fingers, tangling them with his, lifting them over her head, holding her arms there as her body moved in a sensuous dance against his. She rocked down on her heels, slid back up, dragging her buttocks over his thighs, his cock, worked herself against it. She didn’t do impromptu lap or pole dances. But when every cell, every drop of her blood, was infused with erotic promise, promises she was making to her Master, she couldn’t stop her body from communicating those promises.

He brought her to a halt, his hands tight on her shoulders. That, as well as the increased size of his erection, told her she’d done what she’d intended. But he’d made his lesson clear earlier, and she wasn’t being pushy. Just offering herself to him however he wanted. He was as cognizant of the difference as she was affected and shaken by it now.

A few minutes later, she realized there was another reason the K&A men had decided to let play commence in earnest. A whir of gears heralded the lift returning, and Ben and Marcie stepped out of it, Ben opening the door for his new bride.

With session protocol now in place, there was no dramatic entrance or fuss to their arrival, obviously their preference. Celeste suspected Ben had wanted his wife to step into the dreamlike black-and-white world, saturated with the sensual play they both knew and embraced. Now everything was about Doms and subs, surrender and mastery, not about the two of them holding the spotlight. Each play in process was only about the players themselves, and the audience was like the shadows, part of the ambiance.

Ben wore black slacks and a white dress shirt, and he’d been loosening his black tie when he stepped off the lift. His coat was already folded over his arm, so he put both tie and coat over a rack provided for clothing. Marcie stood where he’d left her, watching the multiple scenarios unfolding before her. Her eyes and mouth were soft with arousal and Celeste suspected there’d been plenty of play between them before they arrived. Unlike all the other women here, Marcie wore white instead of black. It was a short slip of a dress, and she had on a pair of teetering high silver heels with ankle bands that appeared to be slim steel cuffs, padlocked so the shoes couldn’t be removed from her feet. Slim silver chains ran up her legs from her ankles and disappeared beneath the hem of the dress.

Ben returned to her. His expression was a complement to hers, fully set with a Master’s intensity, more amplified than what Celeste remembered. Marcie was already well into the zone where Ben wanted to take her tonight. From his reciprocal absorption, she expected he was in a comparable Dom space. The intensity of the energy around them said the loft could be empty, for all the awareness they had of others.

Under the hands of her own Master, Celeste’s reaction intensified as well.

Ben removed Marcie’s dress, hung it on the same rack. She stood on display, waiting for him, though her gaze was devouring everything happening around her. Whereas Celeste knew she herself had strong submissive tendencies, Marcie was that way down to the bone. She could live this way 24/7 and only desire more. While Celeste knew she couldn’t say the same, seeing it displayed in such a beautiful way between Master and sub was like being given a glimpse of something extraordinary and perfect in nature, a dynamic rarely seen as it was intended to be.

Marcie was naked beneath the dress except for her piercings. She had small silver hoops at her nipples, her navel and her clit. Tonight they were connected by one delicate silver chain that, just past the clit piercing, attached to silver bands on her thighs, and then down to the cuffs at her ankles, forming a glittering web of chain that kept her movements dependent on the guidance of her Dom.

When Ben turned Marcie toward him, Celeste saw more silver strands of chains ran down her back from her collar. She had wide, closely fitted cuffs on her wrists. Ben pulled her arms behind her and folded them, latching her forearms together with the rings on the cuffs and attaching them to the web of chains along her back to hold them there. Fixing a tether to her collar, he put a hand under her elbow and started to walk her across the room. She had to move in graceful, small steps, such that it was like watching a geisha move. The way Marcie stared at Ben, it was as if he gave her the power to soar. Despite having less than six inches of play between her ankles, Marcie could do no less than soar when her Master held her gaze like that.

For all that she’d experienced it only for a short time, Celeste knew that feeling well. She was holding her breath, watching the two of them. Most in the room were watching them just as intently. No matter their level of play or commitment as Doms and subs, Ben and Marcie were the embodiment of all of it, the ideal of all the different hopes and yearnings being realized here.

Celeste curled her fingers in Leland’s hands, folded low over her waist, and she let out a shuddering breath, a sound of joy as he kissed her throat, then kept his jaw to her temple so they could watch together, their bodies so close she felt his heartbeat against her back, the way his chest expanded as he breathed.

Ben took Marcie toward the canopy bed. He carried her up the two steps, setting her back on her feet at the foot of the bed. Bending her forward, he adjusted the chains and bindings so her collar was hooked to the foot of the bed, her chin resting on it as he spread out her ankles. Unhooking the chains from the thigh cuffs, he used that length of chain to hook her legs to the rails, then he did the same to her arms. They were all fragile threads she could break if she resisted at all, but she stayed motionless, except for a quiver that was as potent as a ripple through the firmament. Ben propped his Italian shoe on the bottom railing of the bed as he ran one hand down over her ass and cupped the weight of her breast in the other. Playing with the nipple ring, he tugged on it so she let out a moan. The act was purely proprietary. Proof of full ownership.

Leland caressed Celeste’s neck, and she shuddered at feeling that same kind of touch from him. He stroked her neck underneath the thin chain of the necklace, and pushed the straps of her dress off her shoulders so he could explore her skin there unimpeded. This wasn’t like being near a climax. It was beyond that. She was trapped in the same kind of delicate web as Marcie. Every part of her was stimulated, her mind a still point in the whirling convection of her body’s needs.

“Look at all of them, Celeste. What do you like? What do you want me to do to you?”

She slid her gaze from Ben and Marcie, since he was now examining a very lethal-looking silver paddle with holes in it. She wasn’t sure if she could handle watching him use that on Marcie. She knew Marcie was a pain junkie, but knowing and watching it could be different. Instead, her attention fluttered over and alighted on Rachel. Jon had taken his wife to a padded St. Andrew’s Cross. She was sliding her hands along the sleek wood, pressing herself against it. Slipping a foot out of a high heel, she drew her toes along the sleek wood grain at the bottom of the X, toying with the cuff attached to the ring embedded there. Jon stood a few feet away, watching her. His ebony hair fell to his shoulders, the black slacks and matching shirt he wore making him an enthralling sight to any woman. His stillness added to the sexual tension weaving between the two. Rachel kept her back to him, as if oblivious to his presence, yet her every motion was an exhortation to come closer, to put her on the cross, to bind her and make her helpless.

Her rounded hips and generous bosom, her body toned from her yoga practice, gave her a Mother Earth type sensuality. As Marcie had mentioned, Jon was the leanest of all the K&A men, but the strength and power that emanated from him made him more than strong enough to Master and shelter the woman who responded to his every shift, the low commands he spoke to her.

Jon was a spiritual man, kind and compassionate. But right now he was also a sharply focused Dom who held every bit of control. Closing the distance between him and his sub, he ran his hand over her ass, tugged her to him with a firm handful of her skirt. Bending his head, he kissed her with hot intent, pinning her against the cross with his body as he shifted his hips to rub his arousal against her mound. Rachel dropped her head back, lips parting. The black dress she wore had a snug zippered top with a low neckline, her breasts spilling out of it when he clasped the tab and opened the zipper’s teeth a few inches to reveal her bra. As he trailed his fingers over her curves, Celeste felt heat sizzle along the same track between her own breasts.

“Keep looking,” Leland ordered in his quiet rumble. His hand slid down Celeste’s front, under her skirt, fingers teasing her thighs. They loosened automatically as his other arm clasped her waist, holding her up when her knees couldn’t.

“Please…”

“You want me to touch your cunt. Fuck you with my fingers.”

“Yes, sir. Please.”

“Not yet. I’m not usually this mean, darlin’, but seeing all this, I want you to do more than beg. I want you promising me your soul. I want you giving me everything. When that happens, no matter where we go together after this, every time you fight me—and I know you will, again and again—we’ll both remember this night, and know this was when you gave it all to me. No, don’t look back at me. You keep looking at all of them. Your lips are all wet and parted, and your pulse is racing. It’s making me harder, but I want to go beyond that. I want you so needy to be fucked that I’ll tear apart the world to be the one to spread your thighs and thrust into all that wet heat. The only one.”

Her fingers were digging into the forearm he had wrapped around her waist, her breath becoming more erratic as his voice deepened, vibrated through her. His grip tightened and she couldn’t move. She could only do as he commanded.

Keep looking.

Matt was on one of the short sofas, Savannah curled up next to him. His hand rested on her hip, stroking it as they watched the scenes happening around them. Like Leland, Celeste knew they didn’t play publicly, preferring to be voyeurs, so what they did next was pretty blatant for them. Matt said something in her ear, his lips and then his teeth capturing it as he put his hand behind her head. He loosened her hair from its twist, then tangled his hand in the thick strands as they fell to her shoulders. Bringing her head down so her cheek rested on his thigh, he kept his grip on her hair, holding it so her face was turned up toward his. Gazing at her intently, he slid his other hand off her hip and behind her. From her shudder, the sensual movement of her hips, he’d found her under her skirt, was playing and stroking her cunt.

When Savannah’s legs twitched in their folded position, Celeste saw Matt had bound her legs from ankle to knee with a nylon black-and-white rope. Savannah’s hand dropped, caught the fabric of his slacks over his shin as she reached up with her other hand, twisting her upper body in the throes of pleasure to grasp his shirt front, an anchor in the storm. Matt wasn’t in the mood to wait on her orgasm, any more than Lyda had been for Gen. It suggested what kind of night this was going to be, since it was still way early.

Savannah made a keening noise, her body arching. Matt leaned over her, shielding her face as he cradled her jaw, held her in place while he massaged her firmly through all of it. Though the position muffled her cries, Celeste could still hear them, and her own body was rigid as if experiencing that climax with her. Savannah jerked, rocked, cried out. Matt never let up on the rhythmic movement of his hand’s manipulations inside her. When his wife finally finished, he tipped up her flushed face and crooned to her while he continued to move his arm in what appeared to be a slow thrust and retreat. Celeste’s pussy was contracting on itself as if feeling that coital rhythm far more directly.