So even though he found Kaitlyn Prior bewitchingly lovely and incredibly desirable—even though he longed to kneel at her feet and give her anything she wanted—he had promised himself to keep some distance between them. Now, because of the way he’d acted in Commander Sylvan’s office, he was going to have to work twice as hard to keep her at arms length.
But I can do it—I have to do it. She can’t fucking know what I am—what happened to me. It would fucking repulse her and I don’t want that.
He might not ever have her as a mate, but he still wanted to keep her in his life—he wanted to keep working with her—to serve her and protect her. Of the various human females he had guarded, she was the only one who drew him—maybe because her demeanor reminded him so strongly of the long-lost Mistress Lovelyone and his time on Yonnie Six so many years ago…
Stop thinking about that and get ready for the fucking mission. From now on, the past stays in the past.
With that resolve in mind, Braze headed for his suite. It was time to put his memories away and pack for the new mission—a mission where, no matter what, he must not show his true self to the female he was protecting.
3
KAITLYN
“Okay, well…I guess I’m ready to go.” Kaitlyn looked down at herself uncertainly. They were in orbit around Salimba Prime and she had just come out of the long-range shuttle’s fresher, where she had been changing into the outfit Kat had made for her.
The outfit, which was especially for her first meeting with the Salimban Empress, Shatezarra the Third, consisted of a dark blue corset type garment which laced up the front and only came halfway up her breasts. It barely covered her nipples and didn’t offer much support, but luckily, she was wearing a pair of float dots—tiny anti-gravity devices that stuck to the undersides of her breasts and made them perky despite their large size.
The severity of the corset was lessened by the bottom of the outfit, which was a loose, flowing skirt made of a light, diaphanous fabric that floated around her legs like a dark blue cloud. But the shoes she was wearing were thigh-high black leather boots that buttoned up the insides with a long row of tiny silver buttons that went from ankle to inner thigh. Kaitlyn had only buttoned the top ones so far—it was going to take forever to do them all.
To be perfectly honest, the clothing made her think of something she might wear to a fetish club—she ought to know, since she had visited one several times following her divorce. Unfortunately, it had been a disappointing experience both times, Kaitlyn admitted to herself.
After all the fantasies she’d had and all the BDSM books she’d read, the real thing was actually a let down. The people who frequented the club just seemed…ordinary. Half of them didn’t even bother to dress up, which irritated Kaitlyn to no end. And the other half were just too extreme.
She had seen a few interesting things—one was a display of a Dom flogging his sub with various implements and then giving her aftercare following the show. Kaitlyn hadn’t particularly cared for the whipping part, but she had liked watching the way the sub snuggled against her Dom as he cradled her in his arms, murmuring soothing nothings in her ear and rubbing cream into the reddened skin of her ass. The intense connection was clear between them—it was the kind of deep, intimate communication Kaitlyn had always longed for with a partner.
She’d also attended an eye-opening lecture on how to train your sub when she’d gone to a “Femdom Friday” event. The Domme giving the lecture had demonstrated various methods of punishment including whippings with a paddle or locking your sub’s cock up in a small metal cage that fit around his penis and balls. She had also used an industrial-sized roll of cling-film to bind her sub to a pole before beating him soundly with a cane while he groaned his pleasure at her rough treatment.
The display had been interesting to Kaitlyn…but not arousing. Honestly, though she was extremely interested in the Kink community, that kind of thing wasn’t for her. She didn’t like the idea of beating or hitting a sub—though she could definitely get into some light bondage. Tying a sub’s hands above his head and blindfolding him so she could tease him with feathers and fur sounded immensely appealing—“sensation play,” it was called, and Kaitlyn would have loved to try it.
There were other things she wanted to try too, but Mark, hadn’t had any interest at all. Kaitlyn had often thought that if you looked up the word “vanilla” in the dictionary, you would find a picture of her ex staring back at you. He’d tried to shame Kaitlyn for her desires, which she had suppressed for years. But eventually she had realized that life was passing her by, and she wasn’t getting what she wanted out of it.
Matters had come to a head when she’d found out that Mark was cheating on her with a twenty-year-old intern at his work. She had filed for divorce and promised herself to pursue her secret desires…but so far, she hadn’t found what she was looking for.
I don’t want to beat or hurt or humiliate anyone, she thought, looking down at the strange but sexy outfit she was wearing. She also didn’t want to make her male sub dress up like a girl—that practice, which was called “Sissyfication” or “Feminization”—didn’t appeal to her. What she actually wanted was just to be in charge in the bedroom—something Mark would never tolerate.
Then again, he’d never wanted to do anything but missionary-style sex with the lights off—which invariably ended after one or two minutes of thrusting and grunting that did nothing for Kaitlyn. She craved hours of kinky foreplay—role reversal and power play—and a man who wanted desperately to pleasure her. But to be honest, she would have settled for a guy who would let her blindfold him or be on top once in a while. Was that too much to ask?
Well in this dating scene it certainly seemed to be. Kaitlyn had only been divorced a year and already she was beginning to think she was going to be single the rest of her life.
None of the human guys she’d met on the dating apps had any interest in participating in what Kaitlyn had learned was called “Gentle Femdom”—a female-led sexual relationship without pain or humiliation. They either thought of themselves as “Alpha Males” who would never let a woman take the lead, or they went too far in the other direction and wanted her to dress them up in lingerie and degrade and humiliate them. Why was it so hard to find something in the middle?
And as for dating one of the huge Kindred warriors she worked with aboard the Mother Ship, every single one of them was Alpha to the core. As nice as they were, she couldn’t imagine any of them wanting to submit to her in the bedroom…
“You look fucking hot…Mistress.”
Braze’s deep, growling voice made her look up in surprise. She’d almost forgotten the big Beast Kindred was there, she’d been so busy thinking about the sad and hopeless state of her love life. She saw that he was turned around in the pilot’s seat and staring at her, his golden eyes blazing.
“Oh, er, thank you.”
She cleared her throat. Braze had never looked at her like this before—well, aside from the meeting in Commander Sylvan’s office—and she found she rather liked it. Feeling her Protector’s eyes on her body made her lift her chin and take a breath which gave him a better view of her breasts, spilling out the top of the corset.
“You’re welcome, Mistress.” There was a hungry growl in his voice that made her heart pound.
“I don’t think you’re supposed to call me ‘Mistress,’ when we get down to Salimba Prime,” she said, coming towards him. The high-heeled boots gave her a sway in her walk that moved her hips seductively and Kaitlyn leaned into it. She felt like she was strutting on a catwalk, and she liked the way Braze was looking at her. It made her feel sexy and desirable.
“What do I fucking call you then? Wife? Spouse? Mate?” He raised his eyebrows at her.
“According to the sites I found on the Outerweb about the Salimbans, the husband usually calls his wife a pet name like ‘my goddess,’ or ‘cherished one.’ Something like that.” She shrugged as she came to a stop in front of him, daring him to keep looking at her.
