I’m about to head out for the night, giving up on any hope of satisfaction, when I collide with a soft body. She stumbles backward, her high heels teetering when I reach out and grab her arms to steady her.

“Shit!” she screeches and clings to my arms. She’s a mess of blond hair and heels that are too high and should be illegal.

“Steady,” I mumble and pull her forward. I forget about the hard-on still straining against my jeans.

“Thanks,” she says behind her hair as she finds her footing, but she’s still clutching my forearms. “What a shit night,” she mutters when she releases my arms and brushes the hair away from her face.

“I saw,” I tell her when I realize it’s Alese. “That guy seemed like a complete prick.”

She closes her eyes and exhales. “You have no idea.” Her eyes dip down to my crotch before flitting back to my face. “Not a good night for you either?”

I should remind her of protocol. She should be calling me Sir, but right now I think she could use a break, and I’m too sexually frustrated to even care. “No, but not as bad as you, piccola.”

Her nose wrinkles. “What’s that mean?”

I hold out my hand near her face, waiting for her to give me approval when she nods. “It’s an Italian term of endearment,” I tell her as I brush a strand of hair away from her eyes. “Something like little one.”

“I’m not little.” Her cheeks flush, and she breaks eye contact.

I smirk, not realizing I’m still touching her face. Alese may be around 5’6” without heels and over 5’10” with them, but she still doesn’t match my 6’4” frame. “But you are, compared to me.” My hand slides across her skin instinctively, cradling her cheek in my hand.

Her tongue darts out, sweeping across her bottom lip. “Thank you,” she whispers, keeping her eyes downcast.

“Do I make you uncomfortable?” My thumb moves across her skin, slowly stroking her cheek.

She swallows hard, still not looking me in the eyes. “Yes.”

My cock grows, loving the way she responds to my touch and her inability to look me in the eye.

Tonight’s display with the newbie member isn’t the first time she’s had trouble either. Time after time, she would try to give herself to someone but ultimately fail. She has a trust issue. Sometimes she’d try to be a Domme, taking classes, but she never really had the ability to boss anyone around.

“Do you want to have a drink with me, Alese?” It comes out of my mouth without a thought.

Her head snaps back, bringing her gaze to mine. “Now?”

“Yes.” I nod and scan the room, seeing two open seats at the bar. “We can sit at the bar if you’re more comfortable. I think we both deserve to unwind a little before we leave.”

Her eyebrows draw together, and she looks serious. “Just a drink.”

“Just a drink,” I tell her and nod. “Bar?”

“Um,” she mumbles and pulls at her lip, peering around my body and scanning the bar. She shakes her head with a slight frown. “I’d rather sit in a booth, please.”

“As you wish.” I hold out my arm to let her walk in front of me, but I have ulterior motives. I want to check out her ass, and I prefer not to have my hard dick on full display.

She pauses for a moment, glancing down at my crotch before giving me a crooked smile. “I understand.” She winks and takes off toward the booth area, swaying her hips from side to side on her five-inch heels.

She stops in front of the dance floor, scanning the booths. “Where do you want to sit?”

“You pick.” I rub my chin and watch her carefully, trying to figure out why she now looks so appealing to me.

“Hmm,” she mumbles and purses her lips. Her eyes sweep to the left and then to the right. “I just don’t know. Maybe.” She moves to her left and heads toward the one at the end, but she stops and turns around. “No, not down there.”

“No?”

“I don’t want to sit by the bathrooms.”

“Okay,” I mutter and bite the inside of my lip to stifle my laughter. “To the right.”

She stops walking and peers down at the end. “But that’s near the VIP area. I don’t think I want to sit by them.” She chews the nail on her index finger and looks between the two booths. “I don’t know. You pick.”

Her reaction is completely in tune with her personality. She wants to be in charge, but she can’t make a decision. Being a Dominant, whether male or female, a person needs to be able to make a decision and follow through. From the whispers I’ve heard around The Club, Alese doesn’t have the ability to make decisions about little things, let alone ones that deal with sexual dominance.

I place my hand on the small of her back and stare down at her. “May I?”

Her shoulders slump, and her chin dips toward the floor. “Yeah. It’s fine.”

“Let’s go down by the VIP area.” My hand presses harder, resting near her bottom, moving her toward the right to the quieter end of The Club.

She doesn’t pull away, but she walks in step with me as we head toward the table, allowing me to keep my hand against her skin. After she slides in, I follow, leaving about a foot of space between us—just enough room to make her uncomfortable and test her boundaries. She doesn’t try to scoot away, but she fidgets with her hands in her lap and avoids eye contact.

I motion to the waitress and look down at Alese. “Do you want to talk about what happened earlier?”

She bows her head and concentrates on the movements of her hands. “I don’t know.”

“It’ll stay between us. Maybe I can help you work through whatever problem you had with him so it doesn’t happen again.” I’m lying. I really want to get in her head. Find out what makes her tick and what triggered her to run away from the Dom.

“I need a drink first.”

“What can I get ya?” Marta, the waitress, asks and keeps her eyes downward, unlike the girl earlier.

“I’ll take a Johnnie Walker Blue, and Alese would like…” I pause and look over at her. “What do you want?”

She shrugs. “Wine?” She says it more like a question than an answer.

“She’ll take a glass of Dom Perignon, Marta. Thank you.”

“Yes, Sir.” She nods and saunters toward the bar behind our booth.

“Thanks,” Alese says.

“You’ve had a bad night. You deserve only the best.”

We sit in silence and wait for Marta to return. She sets the drinks down, staring at me under her eyelashes before giving a sideways glance to Alese and pursing her lips.

“Thank you, Marta.” She smiles and disappears.

I move the champagne closer to Alese using the backs of my fingers. “Drink up.”

She grabs the flute with both hands and lifts it to her mouth. Her fingers tap nervously against the glass while she gulps. She’s changed out of her Club clothes and has on a pair of jeans and a spaghetti strap tank top that shows just the right amount of cleavage.

Before I even raise my glass, she sets the empty flute down and slumps forward. I pause, holding mine in front of my lips. “Do you want to tell me what happened now?” My eyes never leave her, locking on to her over the rim of my glass.

“I wanted to play tonight.” Her voice is soft as she speaks toward her lap. “We talked for a long time before I finally agreed to go with him.”

“Did you discuss your desires and limits before you agreed to play with him?”

She nods and her chin quivers. “I did.”

“Okay, so what happened when you went with him?” I want to ask about her list, but I figure it’s none of my business since we’re not going to be doing a scene together.

She squirms in her seat. “Everything was going fine. We were going to start playing, and things got out of hand.”

My eyes narrow, tightening on her face. “Look at me, Alese,” I command, waiting for her to comply. When she does, I continue. “I need specifics. Maybe we can figure out what went wrong so you don’t have the same mistake in the future.”

She swallows and clutches her chest with her arms. “He strapped me spread-eagled to the table.” She blows out a shaky breath. “It was cool at first. Then…” She pauses, and tears start to form in her eyes.

Suddenly I feel like an asshole for pushing her to talk. “Alese,” I whisper and move closer, putting my arm around her shoulder. “You don’t have to continue.”

She wipes her face and looks up at me. “I want to finish.” Her voice is a bit stronger, but she’s still hesitant. “He blindfolds me, which isn’t my favorite, especially when I don’t know someone.” She glances toward the ceiling and squeezes her eyes shut. “I didn’t know what he was going to do next.”

I stroke her arm, slowly sliding my fingers around her skin to soothe her. “He gagged me,” she whispers and drops her chin.

Moving my fingers to her face, I raise her eyes to me. “There’s nothing to be embarrassed about. He went against your limits. We’re all into kink, and for that, I’ll never judge you. I want to help and nothing more.”

She nods and lifts her chin. “I screamed, but no one could hear me with the gag in.” She drags her eyes to mine. “I was so scared. I panicked.”

“Is that all that happened?”

She touches her throat. “Can I get another drink?” Her lips smack together, and I want to feel them under my fingers.

I’ve barely touched mine because I’ve been too busy watching and listening. “Stay here. I’ll get another.”

As I walk to the bar, I can’t get the image of her spread-eagled and completely helpless out of my mind. “Another,” I tell the bartender and set her glass on the counter.

Reaching down, I adjust my cock, which hasn’t gone down since the moment I ran into her. At this rate, I’ll still have blue balls when I drive home. Listening to her speak turns me on.

I don’t notice when Beebee sets the glass back down in front of me. “Ret, are you okay?” she asks, touching my hand and pulling me out of my thoughts.

“I’m fine,” I tell her, waving off her concern before grabbing the glass and heading back to the booth.

“Here, piccola.”

She immediately takes it and starts to take a large gulp. I touch her hand, pushing the glass away from her mouth. “Slow down.” Some of the champagne dribbles down her chin, and I catch it with my fingertips. If she were mine to do with as I wished, I’d have her suck every drop off my fingertips. But instead, I lick the champagne off my own. “Where were we?”

She moves the flute around the table and avoids looking at me. “So he gagged me, which was already on my off-limits list of activities.”

“Look me in the eyes when you speak, please,” I tell her because I want to see what really terrifies her and what may actually turn her on if she just gives it a chance.

“Sorry.” She winces and draws her bottom lip between her teeth. When she releases it, there are tiny teeth marks in her flesh.

I move, adjusting my cock in my pants from the sight of her marked flesh. If she glances down and catches sight of my hard-on, I’ll probably be the next person to get slapped in the face.

“So after he tied me up, blindfolded me, and gagged me, he attached nipple clamps. But not just any nipple clamps.” She clutches her breasts in her palms and crosses her arms. “He used forceps, but he clicked them one too many times.”

“Fuck,” I mutter, scrubbing my hand down my face. Those could be powerful weapons when playing with the right person, especially if they enjoyed pain.

“I screamed and tried to stop him from attaching the next one, but I was tied too tightly to the table and my cries were muffled by the gag.” She raises the glass and looks up at me, and I nod my approval. When she sets it back down, she licks her lips. “So there I am—blind, unable to speak, bound, and with forceps pinching my nipples so tightly tears started to stream down my face.”

“I gotcha.”

“Then I feel something cold against my clit,” she stammers and closes her eyes. “It’s a pump, and I can’t wiggle away from it.”

My brows furrow, and although I’m turned on, I’m also pissed off. If I saw that man right now, I’d tie him down to a table and use a fuck machine to penetrate him in the ass until he screamed for mercy. The entire time I’d use an electric cattle prod on his balls, shocking him over and over again.

“But I can’t get away,” she whispers and covers her mouth.

“Where the fuck were the Suits?” They’re supposed to be there to stop shit like this from happening to a Club submissive.

“I don’t know.” She wipes her eyes, using her fingertips near the edges by her thick, catlike eyeliner. “So after he put the pump on me, I thought I was going to pass out. My heart was racing and I couldn’t breathe. I started to choke on my own spit.” Her hand rests on her neck and she swallows. “I heard something metal clinking together.”

“Wait. Was he saying anything during this?”

“Every time I screamed, he’d slap the inside of my thigh and call me a dirty slut.” Her legs close, not in the way to lessen her hunger, but to stop a memory. “I’m not a masochist, Ret.”

“Understood.” I nod and feel a little pang of sadness at her admission. She may not be a masochist, but I’m sure I’d find a way to make some level of pain enjoyable. If it’s done right, with more pleasure, the pain fades and helps heighten the sensation.

“I was thrashing and yelling as much as I could, and before he could use the metal thing I heard on me, the door flew open and a Suit appeared.”

“Thank fuck,” I mumble. Assholes like this “Dom” she went with turn people off to the kink they came here for in the first place.

“I was so scared of him. When the Suit came in and removed my gag and blindfold and asked if I wanted the scene to end, I said yes. When he pushed me further and asked if the man had done anything to me against my will, I lied.” Her head drops forward, and her hair cascades in front of her face. “I was too scared of him to tell the truth.”

“Piccola.” I gently place my arm around her shoulder and stroke her skin. “Come here,” I tell her, urging her to move closer. “Cry on me if you must.”

Without hesitation, she curls into my side, burying her face near my chest, and cries. Her tiny hands fist my shirt, clutching harder, matching her sobs. My hand strokes her hair, comforting her in her time of need.

As a Dom, I have rules. Every Dom should have them.

I never torture anyone against her will. Hell, I’ll push a boundary or two, but only if we have complete trust in one another. Never before, and never without complete certainty that it’s something she truly wants. Too many people come to clubs to play and get their kink on, but without a realization of what the lifestyle truly means or the repercussions playing with strangers may cause.

“It’s okay,” I whisper down at her. “You’re safe with me.”

She cries for a few more minutes, before wiping her tears on my black shirt. She peers up at me with puffy red eyes, and it adds another layer to my fantasy. She’s beautiful, but the tears make her blue eyes almost glow. “Thank you, Ret. You’re a good guy.”

I smile, but I know those words aren’t true. A good guy wouldn’t want to do everything the man who had tortured her had done. A good man wouldn’t sit here with a semi hard-on as she cried into his shirt. Fuck. A good man wouldn’t want to see her cry again and know that he caused her the pain that made her weep. But I wanted all those things. “Would you like me to drive you home?” I ask to keep up with the good guy theme she’s bought into.

She blinks rapidly as her red eyes widen. “You’d do that for me?” Her hand fists my shirt tighter as she gazes up at me.

“I would.” I tap my index finger against the tip of her tiny, slender nose. “I want to make sure you get home safely.” I’ve never driven a girl home from The Club, no matter how rigorous our time together had been. But there’s something different about Alese. I want to explore her depths and crawl inside her brain.

“I’m a mess,” she says and sits up, wiping the tears that have caused her mascara to streak down her face.

“You’re beautiful just the way you are.” Because, believe it or not, there’s nothing sexier than seeing smeared makeup from crying.

“I am?” She gapes at me with wide eyes. “You think I’m beautiful?” she whispers.

“I do.” I smile and squeeze her shoulder tighter, pulling her closer against me. A small smile spreads across her face, and the sadness in her eyes vanishes. Using the back of my hand, I wipe away the few stray tears that cling to her cheeks. “Let me take you home and make sure you’re safe. We’ll talk another day.”

“You want to talk to me again?” The pupils of her eyes dilate as she shifts in her seat.

I have her and I know it. She can’t hide the subtle clues that her body throws off. “I do, but only if you’re comfortable with me.”

“But I…” she starts to say and wrinkles her nose. “I’ve heard things.”

I laugh because I can only imagine the shit that has been said about me. “What have you heard?”

She glances down, unable to look me in the eye. “You never play with someone more than a few times without growing bored of them. You’re strict and want complete obedience. Also, you’re looking for nothing long term.”

“That’s not true.”

She tilts her head back against my chest and peers up at me. “Which part?”

“That I’m not looking for anything long term.” My hand sweeps up and down her arm, the warmth of her skin sending little sparks through my fingertips.

The tiny creases in her forehead deepen, and she pushes herself away from me. She adjusts her body, straightening her back, and looks me straight in the eyes. “Why haven’t you found a partner, then?”

“Are you looking for something long term?”

“Yeah.”

“Why haven’t you found a partner?”

She chews on her bottom lip for a moment. “I haven’t found the right match.”

“Me too, Alese. I refuse to settle for anything less than perfection.”

Her face relaxes and she snorts. “Perfect doesn’t exist. You’re going to be waiting a while.”

I laugh too because she’s probably right. Lifting the scotch to my mouth, I watch her eyes as they twinkle from the overhead lighting.

“I keep hoping to find a partner, but there’s always something that stops me.” She places her hands on the delicate stem of her champagne and turns the glass slowly between her fingertips. “I don’t know if I can keep trying after what happened tonight.” She presses her lips together and narrows her eyes while she’s staring at the glass. “I never thought I’d be that girl.”

“What girl is that?” I ask, taking another sip of my drink, letting it sit on my tongue before swallowing.

She leans backward and slouches down in the booth. “I’m going to be the forty-year-old woman who’s never been married, with a house full of cats to keep me company.”

I move my glass, swirling the ice cubes through the liquid and watching the ripples splash against the sides. “How many cats do you have?” I ask before taking another sip.

“None.” She laughs softly and covers her mouth. “I just see it in my future,” she mutters behind her palm.

I start to laugh and choke on my scotch. “You’re funny.”

She shrugs, dropping her hand, and begins to fidget with the glass. “I just don’t want to be the stereotypical old maid.”

I place my hand on her forearm, rubbing her skin with my thumb. “You won’t be. You just need to be more selective about who you play with.”

“And what about you?”

“What about me?”

“Why are you still single? You’re handsome, Ret.” She smiles sweetly, glancing at me out of the corner of her eye.

I smirk at the compliment. “You’re quite beautiful, Alese. Stop selling yourself short and playing with just anyone. Be selective.”

She scoffs. “I’m not easy to deal with.”

I chuckle softly and squeeze her arm. “None of us is.” She gives me a toothy grin, and I use the opportunity to rub her arm with my palm. “Let me ask you a question. I’ve heard you’re a switch and that you keep trying your hand at being a Domme. Why?”

She sits up, keeping her arm under my hand, and props her elbow on the table before resting her head in her hand. “I tried for a while to be a submissive. After I got frustrated, I figured maybe I was wrong and really wanted to be the one in control. So I started training, going to workshops here, and learning everything I could. But then when I find someone to let me play with them, it turns into a total mess.”

“How so?” I ask, watching her reactions carefully.

“I just never know what to do next. Even after we have a lengthy discussion of their hard and soft limits, I freeze up when we’re alone.”

“You’re not a Domme.”

“I’m not?” She gapes at me, her head jerking back slightly.

“You’re not a switch either.”

“I think I am.” Her teeth dig into her bottom lip again, chewing on her tender flesh as her forehead wrinkles.

“I hate to spoil your delusion, but you’re submissive through and through, Alese.”

She purses her lips and narrows her eyes at me. “Then why can’t I find someone who makes me believe it?”

“I can show you.”