Chain clinked and his warm body brushed hers as he reached up over his head to loop a short length of chain through the D ring, letting the ends dangle. Then he clipped her cuffs to the chain. The click of the fasteners locking her to the chain, and in turn to the wall, sent a shiver down her spine. When he stepped back, she was left facing the wall, her arms stretched above her head, chest rising and falling with shallow breaths.
She focused on the soft sound of his steps as he circled behind her, getting things ready.
Then he gathered her hair—too long, she needed a haircut—in one hand. He twisted it into a tail, then tugged, forcing her head back.
Leon leaned into her from behind, forcing her head to turn so he could kiss her hard and deep. He ended the kiss with a punishing bite to her lower lip.
“Safe word,” he murmured.
“Pineapple.”
“Good girl.”
He carefully brushed her hair forward over one shoulder, leaving her back bare. His fingers found the laces of her corset, tugging, loosening, until the garment gave way and slid from her body. He could have undone the hooks on the front, but the ritual of unlacing her was important for both of them.
The cool air kissed her bare back. She heard the whisper of fabric as he knelt, untying her black skirt and letting it too fall away. He gathered her clothing, putting it in the same cloth bag he’d been carrying earlier.
Leaving her alone, naked, and exposed.
Cessie flushed hot under the scrutiny of unseen eyes. She could feel them—the other players, the voyeurs seated around the edges of the Dungeon, watching her. Watching him.
Facing away meant she didn’t actually know if anyone was paying attention to them, allowing her imagination to run wild.Her bare skin prickled, her muscles tensing, but Leon’s hand found her lower back and pressed, firm and reassuring. Back when they were meeting up almost every weekend to scene, getting stripped in front of the crowd had barely registered.
But it had been too long since she’d been vulnerable and naked in front of strangers, and she was tense with nerves.
His touch grounded her and she exhaled slowly, surrendering to it. To him.
There was a soft brush against her side—the tails of the flogger, whispering a promise.
Leon stepped back. “Color?” he asked, his voice low and rough. They used colors for check in, above and beyond the safe word.
“Green, Master,” she answered, her own voice shaking a little.
“Good girl.”
The first strike landed lightly against her upper back. A soft thud, the suede tails spreading the impact without pain. She knew what a flogging looked like—barbaric, harkening back to the savagery of life at sea.
But what it felt like was quite different.
He worked slowly, methodically. He started with her upper back, the strikes sometimes so soft that it tickled.
It was a warmup for both of them.
Then he moved to her thighs.
She kept her feet hip-distance apart and closed her eyes, focusing on the sensation—the weight of the flogger, the rhythm he built, the subtle variations in force.
The flogger snapped against the tender skin just below her ass in a strike harder than any that had come before. She gasped, the “thuddy” sensation blooming bright before fading into a delicious warmth.
Again. Again.
A steady rain of strikes, each one pushing her deeper into her body, further away from the noise in her head. It had surprised her the first time a Dom used a flogger on her where, unless it was being used hard, she didn’t feel the individual falls, but instead it felt like a dispersed, firm touch.
Once her thighs were warm and starting to hurt, he moved to her ass where he lingered, gradually building intensity. The tails licked across her cheeks, the heat blooming there sharper, deeper, as he swung harder. She whimpered, shifting her weight foot to foot, but the cuffs held her fast, a reminder she wasn’t in control.
And she didn’t want to be.
Leon worked her expertly, reading her body, knowing just how much she needed. What had been merely sensation turned to pain as he increased the intensity. Now she could feel individual lines of heat as the flogger tails spread out on impact.
