time to realize that I had a lot of disdain for subs, especially the ones who were eager to obey.
"That was why I stopped. I backed off, because that wasn’t, and isn’t, how this dynamic should work.
"I was a disrespectful cunt, and I actually apologized to the women I dominated. They didn't understand, because I hadn't mistreated them, so they didn't get why I'd be annoyed at myself, but it was a point of honor for me to apologize and for me to move on with my life because no Dom should ever feel that way.
"Submission is something a man earns. It isn't something he deserves."
A noise escaped her, but the gag did its job. I cast a look at my watch, registering I had another twenty minutes max to keep her like this. That was edging it, but Indy liked to push boundaries and I knew she'd tell me if she was in outright pain.
Trust worked both ways.
I tapped her thigh, just above the webbing, and murmured, "Just listen. No talking." A sigh heaved from her, a disgruntled one, and even though I grinned, I murmured, "Now, at the clubhouse, there's a glut of pussy, and I won't lie, I took advantage of it. But the second I saw you on your hands and knees, scrubbing the floor in Stone’s bunkhouse, well, hell, all those old urges came tumbling back.
"I realized that I wasn't just a Dom to get easy pussy, because as a brother, I have access to that all the time.
"Naw, I was a Dom because I like to see a woman stripped bare, and I ain't talking clothes.
"I don't like bullshit, and you're the Queen of Bullshit, Indy." She tensed. "You are. You're a liar. You wear a mask. You hide from the truth because you don't want people to know what you are. Who hurt you.
"You've let men into this beautiful cunt of yours to punish yourself. To make yourself feel something." I reached up and rubbed my fingers over her mouth. "I've seen these sexy lips that look perfect stretched around my cock in all kinds of colors, none of them sexy. You were made for reds and golds, Indy. Not greens or blacks. I've seen you with thick make up, and while that's your choice, and you can wear whatever the fuck you want, it's why you wear it that disturbs me.
"Because you, sweet Indy, are beautiful. You can't hide from it. And you don't have to anymore.
"Covered in saliva, a gag straining the seams of your mouth, sweat on your limbs and beading at your temples... you're beautiful.
"And this beauty is mine. I’m not ready to brand you, and maybe neither of us will ever be ready for that, but we both know, that whatever happens, once that door is closed, this is the real you." I pressed a kiss to her temple. "And I see that real you, and I understand that you, and I want that you. No one else. No other shade of Indy. This Indy. Do you understand me?"
I let the words sink in, let her process them before I asked for an answer to my question, but then I got it.
In sobs.
They wracked her slender frame, poured out of her like a burst of rain in a summer shower. They made her heave with them, her body, already tethered, shuddered with reaction to the outpouring of emotion she hadn't expected to shed.
That I hadn't expected her to shed, in all honesty.
I hadn't said any of this to decimate her.
I'd said it for her to know her fucking worth.
This woman was a fucking queen, and it was time she started living like that.
With nothing else to do, I held her. Until the sobs stopped, until her breathing grew raspy, I was there for her. And then, I pulled out the knife I'd stored with my cell in my pocket, and I started to pop through the taut bindings. Releasing her flesh from the diamond webs, not stopping until she was free.
And when she was, she twisted around and huddled into me, so tightly that it was a struggle to release her mouth from its bondage too.
But I got it.
I did.
And this was honest.
Real.
Exactly what I'd asked for.
So I held her in my arms, gave her what she needed, and let her be the Indy she was born to be.
Mine.
Thirteen
Indy
With the emotional wreckage laying around me, I didn't even notice the pins and needles in my hands and feet