When her body is clean, I move to her hair. It floats around her head like a golden halo. I cup water in my hands, wetting her hair thoroughly, then pour a dollop of shampoo into my palm, working it into a lather against her scalp. My fingers massage in slow, firm circles. The knots from the evening’s activities are tangled there, and I painstakingly ease them out one by one, my fingers gentle and patient.
She murmurs something unintelligible, a sleepy sound of pleasure.
“That’s it, Dumpling,” I murmur, the words a constant, soothing rhythm. “Let me take care of you. You deserve this. After how good you were for me, this is the very least you deserve. My perfect, beautiful pet. Everyone saw, everyone knows now. No one is going to rescue you now. The world knows what you are, what I have turned you into, that you are my greatest triumph.”
I rinse her hair, using a jug to pour clean water over her head, shielding her face with my hand. When the water runs clear I pull the plug and stand, reaching for a large, warmed towel from the heated rack. I lift her from the cooling water and she is a warm, limp weight in my arms, steam rising from her skin. I wrap her in the plush Egyptian cotton, enveloping her completely, and carry her back to the bed.
I lay her on the fresh duvet and retrieve a bottle of lotion from the nightstand. Almond oil, rich and soothing. I pour some into my hands, warming it, and then I begin to anoint her. Starting with her feet I massage the lotion into her skin, working my thumbs into the arch of her foot.
She sighs again, a deeper, more contented sound.
I move up her calves, her thighs, her arms, marking her with this care, sealing my possession not with a brand, but with tenderness. Each stroke of my hands is a promise and a reaffirmation.
I own this body,
I cherish it.
I control its pleasure and its comfort as well as it’s pain.
When her skin is gleaming soft and fragrant in the lamplight, I pull the covers back and tuck her into bed. She looks like a sleeping beauty, waiting for no prince, but for her Master to claim his place beside her.
I move to my side of the room, undressing with quiet efficiency before sliding in beside her, the sheets cool against my skin. The bed dips with my weight, and she instinctively shifts toward the warmth I radiate.
I lie on my side, facing her, propped on one elbow, drinking in the sight of her: the dark fan of her lashes against her cheeks, the parted bow of her lips, the utterly surrendered peace on her face.
This is real power.
Having someone completely and utterly at your mercy, having their very life in your hands. If I wanted, I could curl my fingers around her throat. I could squeeze and squeeze, and she would be no more.
My hand finds her hip under the covers in a light, possessive touch. Then, I reach out and turn off the lamp.
Leaning over, I brush my lips against her forehead. The kiss is soft, lingering. A seal. “Goodnight, Pet,” I whisper into the quiet dark.
Adull, throbbing ache is the first thing I become aware of. It’s a symphony of pain, a deep-set soreness in muscles I didn’t even know I possessed.
My wrists, my shoulders, the small of my back, each one chimes in with its own particular complaint as consciousness slowly, reluctantly, returns to me.
My eyelids are heavy, gummed together with sleep and the residue of… of what? I force them open, blinking against the soft, grey light filtering into the still unfamiliar room. This place is vast, the ceiling a distant expanse of ornate plasterwork. The air smells of lemon polish and something else; something dark, masculine, and foreign.
Confusion wraps around me, thick as the duvet I’m tangled in. Silk. The sheets are black silk, cool and sinfully smooth against my bare skin.
Bare.
I was stripped bare. Stripped on a stage and trussed up like a piece of meat.
The realization is a cold splash of water. I freeze, my breath catching in my throat as my heart begins a frantic, panicked rhythm against my ribs.
I push myself up on trembling arms, the movement sending a fresh wave of soreness through my body. The room spins for a moment, a carousel of opulent nightmare. Dark wood, a huge fireplace, an oil painting of some storm-tossed sea in a heavy gilded frame.
And then, it hits me. Not a full memory, but a flash. A shard of something terrible and bright.
The bass of the music vibrating through the floor and up into my bones. Men’s laughter, low and hungry. Silken ties biting into my wrists as my arms are pulled taut and tied to something that leaves me hanging, suspended.
I am exposed.
A specimen. An offering.
I try to focus on a fixed point, anything to anchor myself in this humiliating storm. My eyes find him.
