“What happened?” he asks dully while I squeeze him all over, terrified that I may have done some lasting damage to his body or his mind.
“You were unconscious.”
“I must have fainted.”
“Did you eat?”
“Some. Maybe it was the heat? Don’t worry, Sir, I’m fine. It won’t happen again.”
I’m more careful after that, making sure that he has eaten and is well hydrated, keeping the temperature of the room a little cooler. I test his alertness at the start of our rope sessions. And I take him to the doctor in Napoli to have bloodwork done. Everything comes back normal.
“Sir, you are overreacting,” he tells me when I inform him that I’m about to lower him during our next suspension scene. I can’t let him go too deep into this meditative state, not until I know he can handle it without fainting.
“I cannot risk hurting you, Gio. Your safety is the most important thing to me.”
The next time this happens, he growls at me, “Not yet, Sir. Give me fifteen more minutes.”
“I’m sorry, Gio. No.”
This quarrel between us occurs twice more, where I end the suspension before he wants to be lowered. Rather than being relaxed and content, as he usually is after a bondage session, he’s moody and irritable. I can see his vexation building, and I worry I might be doing him more harm than good.
“Something is wrong,” I say to him one evening after I’ve untied him. I feel the tension in his neck and shoulders as I massage him from behind.
“I’m fine.”
“Dimmi, Gio. You cannot keep hiding this from me. I only want to help you.”
His head whips around to face me and he says sharply, “Then stop trying to keep me from Master.”
His admission is a gut punch, and I realize what’s been going on. He no longer communes in the middle of the night with that damnable portrait. He’s managed to find his Master elsewhere.
“You are visiting Valentin during our scenes? That is why you want to be suspended for longer, to have the rope tighter?”
He doesn’t answer, but he pulls away from my touch, hunched forward and curled into himself. I’ve been angry at him before, and I have felt hurt and dismissed, but never quite like this. I am too furious for words.
“I’m going outside.” I tell him as I stand. “You may join me if you’d like.”
I tear out of the house and into the yard where I spot an old axe propped up against the toolshed and grab hold of it. There’s a fallen tree on the side of the house that I lay into with the dull blade, chopping away at it like a madman. I may shed a few tears too. I funnel all my rage into this petty destruction and don’t notice that I have an audience until my muscles are sore and my breath is spent.
“Are you mad at me?” Giovanni asks, gripping himself tightly. This is what he says to me whenever he’s feeling guilty.
“You lied to me, Giovanni. I’m your Dominant, and you put me in a dangerous situation. How can I care for you if you’re not honest with me? What if something had happened to you? What if you’d been injured? What if you’d died? I could never live with myself if that happened.”
“I… I didn’t think about it like that.”
“Then what were you thinking?”
“I didn’t want you to feel jealous or think I was crazy.”
My jealousy is a mere trifle when compared with the damage that could have been done to him, and his mental health is another matter altogether.
“You hid this from me. You’ve broken my trust. Your life is much more precious to me than any kink. And keeping you safe is my first priority.Always.The fact that you believe I’d intentionally keep you from your Master hurts me too. You lied to me because you didn’t want me to stop. You used me, Giovanni.”
Tears brim in his eyes—mine too—and even though I’m angry, he must know that even in my frustration, I will not abandon him. I draw him into my arms, and he clutches at me fiercely.
“You’re right. About all of it. I’m so sorry, Silvio.”
“Me too, princess. Me too.”
