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“What are you drinking?” I asked her.
“I better not have anything.”
“No?” I got a beer so I wouldn’t end up too buzzed. I didn’t drink much in general, but with a new prospective play partner, sobriety was a good thing. Ashleigh asked for a Coke. Cute.
I introduced her to a few people, but the majority of my guests were already heading downstairs to the play room. Ashleigh needed more time to get comfortable, judging by the way her gaze darted around the room. I led her over by the fireplace to avoid Trina. Trina was as aggressive as Ashleigh was shy, and she’d been wanting to bottom to me for a while. Trina didn’t do it for me, though. I was ridiculously picky about my submissives, for good reason. When I played, I liked to play hard.
Not that I was going to go balls-to-the-wall with my dancer this evening. The best partners were the ones who made me slow down in the beginning, who revealed desires and vulnerabilities like the petals of an opening flower. Trina would be more like the rose Ruby had ripped up in the limo, a quick shower of petals with a mess left behind. I hated messes.
I turned my back to Trina and focused on Ashleigh.
“So, first things first. Where are you from?” Before she could answer I held up a hand. “Wait. Let me guess. The Midwest.”
She gawked. “How did you know?”
“I didn’t know. It was a guess, like I said. The city is harder.” I pulled at my lower lip, pretending to concentrate. “St. Louis?”
She shook her head.
“Chicago? Milwaukee? No. Cleveland?”
She shook her head again. “You’ve never heard of the place I’m from.”
“Small town?”
“Extremely small.”
“What brings a small-town Midwestern girl to London to dance?”
Her eyes drifted over my shoulder to where Trina was doubtless giving her the get lost glare. She looked back at me. “Rubio brought me here.”
Damn, she was Rubio’s? I hadn’t gotten that message at all.
“I mean,” she said at my confused look, “I came here because he was dancing here, even though it was a step back professionally. I had more options in New York, but I wanted… I decided I needed to be here.”
Her hair was so pretty and dark, the color of blackberries. “Do you regret it?” I asked.
“What?”
“Taking a step back?”
She thought about that for a moment. “I don’t think so. Being part of City Ballet is more important to me than advancing through the ranks of some lesser company.”
“What about tonight?”
If she held her glass any tighter she was going to break it. “What do you mean?”
“I mean, tonight you had a chance in the spotlight. Did it make you question whether you made the right choice?”
She took a deep sip of her drink as Trina moved into my line of sight, standing so her breasts were displayed to maximum effect. I ignored her, concentrating on my thoughtful ballerina. “No, I never question,” she said. “Honestly, I didn’t start dancing out of some desire to become a star. I just enjoy doing it. My body enjoys doing it. I came here to work with Fernando Rubio and Yves Thibault, no matter the cost and sacrifice. It seemed worth it to me.”
My body enjoys doing it. That’s all I heard. I thought very intently about how my body would enjoy dragging her down to my play room, cuffing her to a spanking bench, and going to town on her marvelous ass. I wondered if she would be loud or quiet, if she’d want lots of sex with her play or if she’d prefer to concentrate on impact and pain. I wondered if she had any naughty piercings or tattoos hidden under her non-descript black clothes.
Oh shit, she’d asked me a question. “I’m sorry,” I said, pretending I couldn’t hear her over the music.
“Where are you from?” she asked a little louder. “And how did you end up over here?”
“Business brought me here. I’m from California, by way of Cuba and Ireland.”
She blinked, looking up from her drink. “How does that happen?”
I moved a little closer, out of Trina’s line of sight. “My mother was from Cuba and my father was a Dublin lad.” She laughed when I said Dublin with an Irish accent. “I grew up just outside L.A. so, obviously, I’ve got a lot going on.”
“Obviously.” She had such a pretty smile. I hoped she was one of those girls who liked sex with her BDSM, because there were a lot of things I wanted to do to that mouth. I put my beer on a nearby table. It was time to move things along.
“So,” I asked in my best I’m-a-trustworthy-dominant voice. “How long have you been in the lifestyle?”
“The lifestyle?” She blinked at me. “Forever, I guess. But I’ve only gotten serious about it the last couple years. When I left New York and decided to come here.”
“I see.” Forever sounded promising. I wondered what she meant by getting serious in the last couple years. Was she into edgier play? Hardcore slavery? I hoped she didn’t belong to some other dom, some online motherfucker or something. Only one way to find out, and that was to make my move. “Can I be honest with you?” I said, very close to her ear.
She nodded. “Uh, sure.”
“There’s something about you that intrigues me. Your eyes, or your body. I like little girls.”
Shit, that sounded so wrong. She made a squicked face.
“No, I mean, petite women,” I amended. “Women who are small enough to manhandle a bit. Just for fun, of course.” I slid a hand up her arm, a light, seductive touch. “Ruby’s never invited one of his ballet friends here before. You fascinate me.”
She stood very still beneath my full-force invitation stare. Her expression wasn’t welcoming. I didn’t know if it was due to shyness or disinterest.
“Where’s Rubio?” she asked, looking around. Shit. Disinterest.
“Downstairs in the play room, I imagine.”
“This house has a play room?”
This house? Didn’t she realize this was my house? And why did she think everyone came here to party? I had a basement full of BDSM furniture and equipment—and soundproof walls.
“Want to check it out?” I asked. I’ll admit it, I was proud of the play room I’d put together. Maybe it would change her mind about hooking up with me. I took the glass out of her hand, set it on the table next to my beer. “No drinks allowed down there.”
I held out a hand and her fingers closed around mine. Trina scowled and finally seemed to accept defeat as Ashleigh and I crossed the main room and headed for the stairs. There were tons of other guys here who’d be happy to play with Trina, but Ashleigh didn’t seem to be generating much interest. Well, she was wearing black, shapeless clothes, but her eyes… Her eyes were so wide and pretty, light blue or maybe gray with dark lashes. There was something in the way she moved too, some sensual or ethereal quality that made me want to touch her and hold her in my arms. And she was an American. Midwestern girls. Heh.
To the play room then. I walked ahead of her down the stairs and into the darker, lower floor of the house. We were enveloped by the warm glow of candles and the beautifully erotic sounds of pleasure. Rhythmic thuds accompanied shrieks and muffled screams.
“There’s Ruby,” I said, pointing to a rack near the corner, where his curvy, screeching partner writhed in chains. Rubio was naked, his cock hard and jutting out. He sidled up to his play partner and rubbed his junk between her ass cheeks. I grinned as he ran a groping hand down between her legs and ripped off her g-string, then stepped back and accepted a whip from a nearby assistant. The implement was perhaps three feet long, black braided leather. I turned to Ashleigh, to make some crack about whether she still wanted to talk to him.
My words died at the look on her face.
“Oh my God,” she whispered. Her eyes were wide, her cheeks pale. She looked around the play room in shock.
“What’s wrong?”
“Nothing.” She tried to act cool and nonchalant, but I could tell this wasn’t what she’d
expected. In that terrible moment, I realized I’d misunderstood every one of her signals, realized that we’d been speaking two different languages, fellow Americans or not. Ashleigh Keaton was vanilla, and she was completely freaked out by what she was seeing. I looked over my shoulder and tried to imagine the play room through her eyes. Grasping, whipping, screams and laughter, naked people bound in all kinds of positions on all kinds of equipment, all of them going out of their minds.
I got her attention with light fingers placed at the small of her back. “Hey, you want to go back upstairs? Finish those drinks?”
She nodded. “It’s hot down here, isn’t it?”
We started up the stairs. Her back was ramrod straight and her mouth curved in a fake smile. I wanted to tell her it was all right, that she didn’t have to pretend to be okay with all the hedonism she’d just seen. I’d exposed her—nonconsensually—to some pretty hardcore shit. “Go sit on the couch,” I said when we reached the first floor. “I’ll be right back.”
I stormed down the stairs and did something I never allowed anyone else to do at my place. I interrupted a scene in progress. I grabbed Ruby from behind just before he drew back to throw a whip stroke.
“You fucking prick,” I said, taking his feet from under him and pinning him to the floor. “Why’d you invite her here?”
His play partner grinned over her shoulder, her back a canvas of red-pink whip bites. Ruby grinned too, like this was some kind of joke. “I did it for fun,” he said. “She was standing there in the hall and I brought her. What, she’s not kinky?” He tried to throw me off but I wasn’t having it.
“I thought you knew her,” I said. “I thought she was a friend of yours, that she was in the lifestyle.”
“Oops. No. I never see her before tonight.” He took in my embarrassment, my disappointment in one perceptive glance. “You like her, huh? I hate to tell you, she’s a shitty dancer.”
