In front of us, a man wearing an expensive black tuxedo emerged from the group and took a step up to mount the small stage. He took the feather teaser offered by the naked assistant then trailed it devilishly slowly across the restrained girls nipples down the flat of her stomach, hipbone, thigh.

He observed her try to control her quivering, then agonizingly slowly brought it back up the sensitive inner curves to stroke across the pulled apart lips of her clit.

As the tantalizing whisper stroke brushed across her bulging bare nub, she rocked in a series of shudders that elicited wrath from her master. The men in the crowd spiked with interest, observing the sensations that girl fought to control. They seemed to find that aspect more interesting than the provocative naked exposure of her glistening pink slit.

From behind her back, the new female assistant handed the master a round paddle. He lifted it high then brought it down with a resounding thwack on the blindfolded girls twitching slick pussy. She cringed in her body but only slightly, before she pulled herself tall once more. If her mouth hadn’t been firmly gagged with the bundled silk, her whimpers would surely have echoed around the room.

But after the initial ricochet of shock, her body bounced right back. Flushed and rising resilient, the nipples peaking up hard demonstrated her excitement. The man, whether her master or not, I couldn't tell, shoved three fingers deep inside her channel then pulled them out to examine her level of enjoyment.

He caressed the nectar between his finger pads, as though gauging her pleasure score. A second man, older and exuding absolute authority from every one of his cells, mounted the stage. Immediately the master passed the paddle to him like a relay baton.

He brought her back down with soft swipes of the feather, tickling her sensations to a peak of arousal. Then he bent her forward his fingers tangled in her long hair to spank her lifted round ass until the cheeks fled scarlet red.

“I'm sorry I can't give you what you think you need,” Valentine’s words between gritted teeth were so soft I almost missed them.

I would have had my senses not being so hyper-attuned to him. It was as though he'd read my mind. We stood almost touching side-by-side, staring ahead at the blond who failed to repress her avid hunger for more discipline. Anyone casting a glance in our direction would have thought we were discussing the activity on stage rather than our private struggles.

"A tiger with fixed spots?? A scorpion on the back of a turtle?" I hissed.

What was it he thought I needed?

It was becoming that convoluted. Even I was no longer sure. Whether I was content to exist with the game as it was. Or did I crave the behavior a girl traditionally hoped for from a man?

"Something like that,” he gritted. The heat from his body making my skin flush. “People don't change their basic instinct."

"Or won't."

I was amazed he was permitting this conversation between us. My responses to the master were way out of line for a submissive.

"You've started a second career as a psychotherapist since moving into my house," he muttered. I was sure I detected a tiny smirk at the edges of his mouth.

"I mean that people can choose different behavior without changing who they are," I replied, biting on the adrenaline flinging itself through my veins. “That seems like power to me.”

"Not when you go behind my back to visit my employees," he hissed, the snarl returning.

Valentine knew that I’d hooked up with Josh that afternoon and I could tell it was burning him up. Whatever strange connection they had extended to him not wanting Josh to be inside me.

It made no sense whatsoever. If he’d told Josh to test me as the perfect setup for him, why had he now done a complete turnabout and become incensed that Josh and I had even spoken.

Valentine discovered I had a connection with Marc Chapelle and that had inspired a session of punishment in his dungeon. Was there anything Valentine didn't know about my life and anything that he wouldn't uncover? And why was he so bent on keeping me from the two men he thrown me together with in the first place? Just another one of his games.

"It's lonely out here sometimes, being suddenly abandoned in the darker places," I said.

"Life is just as isolated when you're with the wrong person as being on your own,” he replied.

"Not when the right person closes the shutters to block you."

There, I threw down my hand on the table.

"I think you've done enough talking now. I'm way too indulgent with you.

And just like that Valentine threw up the shutters. I swiveled my head a tiny bit, just enough to observe that curtain coming down over his divine features. I knew the equal communication between us was done, for now.