I wasn’t in my apartment. This room was adorned in black.My pulse raced at the unfamiliar surroundings, but then the events of the day came rushing back. I was at Raven’s, and I’d fallen asleep while she showered. I glimpsed the clock on the nightstand and realized I had been asleep for a few hours.
The bed was cold around me. I tried to reach my arm out in search of Raven, but I couldn’t move. I whipped my head up. What the fuck?
My wrists were cuffed to the bed. I pulled at the restraints, but they didn’t budge. I looked at my feet, noting I was still naked, and they were cuffed, too. In my bleary state, I was disoriented, and panic tugged at me. I had no idea what was going on and my fight or flight response caused my heart to kick my ribs like it was trying to break free of my chest.
“Raven?” I called, trying to keep my voice even. The dark room was foreboding and I was alone. My thoughts traveled to the possibility that she had a stalker. Had they taken her and tied me up to delay me coming after her? How the fuck did I manage to sleep through being restrained to a fucking bed?
I pulled at the cuffs as hard as I could, but the wood didn’t give. I tried to roll over and get better leverage, but my feet kept me from moving.
“Fuck!” I yelled out into the empty room.
Fear stabbed through me like a blunt knife. How the fuck did this happen? Raven was right here with me, and someone had taken her. I was right here and couldn’t manage to protect her. Goddammit, I was a fucking idiot.
I kept pulling on the restraints when footsteps sounded out in the apartment. Were they still here? Maybe I still had a chance to get to her before whoever it was took her away from me. I tried working my wrist through the cuff, but it was too tight. My chest was going to burst if I didn’t get the fuck out of there.
Movement in my periphery caught my attention, and Istilled, looking to the door as it slowly swung open. A hooded figure clad in a long robe stepped over the threshold and I swallowed. Great, they were back to off me before they left with her. Too stunned to speak, I followed the person’s movements as they glided to the bed and reached out a gloved hand.
The leather was strange on my skin as they trailed fingertips up my exposed body, from my hip, along my stomach, to my chest. My lungs heaved as I squeezed my eyes shut, recalling Raven’s beautiful face. If I was going to die, I wanted her face to be the last thing I saw.
“Well, well, look what I caught in my snare. A new toy to play with,” a sweet voice giggled.
My eyes shot open and my cock stirred at the voice I had come to crave, an entirely different feeling flooding my body, replacing the fear that filled me before. “Raven?”
“No. You’ll call me queen. Ma’am and mistress are acceptable as well. You’re not the only one who’s multifaceted, my darling.”
Taken aback, my mouth hung agape while I was laid out naked before her. What the hell was going on? Why was Raven dressed like that, and why the fuck had she tied me up? Reality slapped me in the face, and my cock began to swell.
I’d gotten it all wrong. Raven wasn’t a submissive in bed. I assumed she, like a lot of other strong women, wanted to relinquish control in that vulnerable part of her life, but I couldn’t have been farther from the truth. Raven might have played sub for me, and I didn’t know her motivation behind that, but my sweet Raven was a domme. And I was cuffed to her bed, completely at her mercy. Fuck. This wasn’t on my bingo card.
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Raven
Me in myelement with Ryan cuffed to my bed? The hottest vision I’d ever laid eyes on. Moisture coated my thighs as I ran my glove up and down his stomach. Once he realized it was me in the shroud, he’d gone silent and completely still except for his heaving chest. My gaze was drawn to his hardening cock. Hope flared in me, and I implored him to not shut me down. If he did, though, I would accept it because I didn’t want whatever this was to end.
“You remember the safe word, my prince?”
Ryan’s eyes snapped back into focus on my faceless hood. He swallowed hard, his throat bobbing with the movement.
“If at any time you wish to stop, use the word, and I’ll stop immediately.”
I moved forward and cupped his face with my leather clad hand. His jaw clenched, and I sweetened my words. “No questions. If you don’t want this, it's all right. I’m not going anywhere.”
He closed his eyes, but when he opened them, they were clear. “You’re not going to tell me what’s going to happen, are you?” he asked.
“No, darling. Not even a bit,” I cooed. “I’m sure you can hazard a guess, but the surprise is the best part of this.”
“Why didn’t you tell me? Surely, that would have been something to discuss before restraining me to your bed?” It was more of a question than a statement.
I stood up to my full height, which neared six feet with my heels, and squeezed my fists at my sides to keep myself from punishing him for that. He was going to be a brat. “Questions later. Are you going to use the safe word? Make your decision now,” I said through gritted teeth.
He didn’t hesitate. “No.”
I tilted my head, not unlike the way Ryan always did. “No, what? I need words, love.”
His lips parted slightly at the endearment. I knew exactly what he was thinking, and I was thinking it, too, but I shoved that into a box to sort out later.
“No, I’m not using the safe word,” he finally said.
