Sean caressed her neck, his fingertips gliding down her collarbones to the swells of her br**sts, thumbing her puckered nipple covered by nearly transparent white cotton. “You’re pleasing me greatly.”
He pleased her, too. Everything inside her yearned to show him that. She smiled and lifted her head so he could fit a silky black scrap that looked like a sleep mask over her eyes. Its weight felt light and nonthreatening. Then he clasped her hand. Callie squeezed back.
“Have you ever been both restrained and blindfolded?”
“Not entirely, and only for demonstration purposes.”
She’d actually scened with very few people. Logan Edgington had usually wanted to give her a red ass to correct her bratty behavior. His friend Xander had enjoyed arousing her body, but he’d never awakened even a corner of her heart. She’d spent a little time with some of the other resident Doms at Dominion with similar results. Eric had a fascination with ball gags that made her shudder. Zeb seemed a tad too excited by feet for her comprehension. His nibbling at her toes had icked her out. Jason had not only been a stickler for protocol, but a big fan of Shibari. It had taken Callie less than four minutes to scream her safe word. Then there was Thorpe . . . He was in a class all by himself. And way beyond her reach.
“Demonstration?” Sean sounded shocked.
Callie nodded. “Yeah. But I haven’t done one in about two years.”
Not since that December Thorpe had asked her to bottom for a demo . . . then afterward, behind closed doors, the kindling heat between them had exploded into a tangle of arms and lips, sighs and discarded clothes. She’d been wet and ready and so desperate for him, naked on his bed. Then he’d abruptly walked away without an explanation, behaving as if nothing had ever happened. To this day, she didn’t know why he’d left her. And he’d never asked her to assist him in a presentation again.
That hurt didn’t matter anymore. Old crap. Only Sean was important now.
“Were you able to bear the restraint then because you knew someone would free you if need be? If that’s the case, lovely, the dungeon monitors would have my balls in an instant if they thought I was hurting you.”
“I know.” They were intensely protective of all the women in the club, but especially fellow staff.
“Well, then?” Sean’s swift reply asked how she had managed to be tied down for Dom/sub education purposes when she could barely tolerate it with someone she yearned to put all her trust in. Her only answer was that Thorpe had been the one doing the tying. She trusted him more than she trusted anyone. He knew her quirks and had accommodated them.
But she hated Sean believing that she lacked faith in him. Callie latched on to the first explanation to hit her brain. “Logically, I know you’re right. Sadly, logic doesn’t always penetrate fear. It’s a bit like a phobia.”
He didn’t answer right away, just brushed his thumb back and forth over her nipple until it tingled and she wished he’d just tear off her clothes and f**k her already. She’d wanted him for so many long months.
“Have you always been this way?”
“Since I got into BDSM.” She’d lied to Sean often, but always tried to stay as close to the truth as possible.
“Do you know what caused your fear, lovely? Was it something in your past?”
Callie bit back a snort. Pretty much everything. “It wasn’t any one event.”
And that wasn’t a total lie, just a realization that restraint severely inhibited her ability to flee if her murder rap caught up to her.
“Are you sure? Tell me about your childhood. Maybe something there will help me better understand.”
This again? He must have asked twenty times since snapping a collar around her neck to tell him about her formative years. She managed to simply say that she was from the Midwest and was an orphan. Again, not lies . . . just not the complete truth.
She clenched her hands into fists. “The longer we talk, the more nervous I get. Please . . .”
“We will finish this conversation, lovely.”
No, they wouldn’t.
“Yes, Sir.”
Sean sighed. “You’re doing well, so I’ll reward you now.”
He leaned over her, caressed her shoulders in his big hands, then his nimble fingers made short work of the waist-cinching corset she’d chosen earlier. He began unlacing it just beneath her br**sts, slowly parting the panels down her torso before he detached it from her body. The garment provided enough support under her br**sts to render a bra unnecessary. When he tore off the thin white tank she’d worn beneath, his groan, coupled with his hands cupping her br**sts reverently, told her that he approved.
“Always so damn beautiful, Callie.”
No way to miss the worship in his voice. No man had ever made her feel so wanted.
He plucked at her ni**les, pinching gently, turning the peaked nubs, controlling the flow of blood. The second he released them, sensation slammed into her. Hypersensitive and hard, the nubs tingled and bunched harder. She whimpered.