She immediately stopped and dropped back to her original position.

That was interesting. Nathaniel had never asked me to kiss his feet. I wondered why, wondered if I would act as quickly as Christine if he asked me to do it.

But I didn’t have time to dwell on that thought. From behind his back, Paul brought a black leather collar. “I’ve longed to put this back on you,” he told Christine.

She had told me she no longer wore a collar except when they were in the playroom. Pregnancy and childbirth had changed the dynamics of their relationship, and now they were only dominant and submissive in this room, unlike Nathaniel and me, who were dominant and submissive all weekend.

Her eyes stayed focused on the floor. “I have longed for it as well, Master.”

As he put his collar on her, the significance of the ritual hit me. The staking of his claim on her—showing her with both word and deed that she was his. Likewise, by accepting his collar and his claim, she agreed to his temporary control. She gave herself to him. I understood that part from Nathaniel’s collaring of me, but what caught me off guard was the look in Paul’s eyes as he fastened the collar on her. The intensity of his expression—the pride, the carnal longing—was completely unexpected.

Did Nathaniel look that way when he collared me? Did his expression mirror Paul’s?

With the collar fastened, Paul stepped back, eyes still smoldering. “I want you on your hands and knees on the table.”

Without moving her eyes from the floor, she crawled to the table and climbed on top.

I wondered why she crawled. Was that something Paul expected? Would Nathaniel ever want me to do that? To crawl instead of walk?

Paul walked to stand in front of Christine, slipped a ball gag in her mouth and buckled it around her head.

“I’m going to work you a bit harder than I have lately,” he said, his hands softly stroking her shoulders. “And I want to make sure you don’t scare our guests.” He leaned down to whisper in her ear, although we could still hear. “Plus I love the sounds you make through the gag.”

He slipped something into her hand.

I felt Nathaniel’s breath on my ear. “It’s a bell,” he whispered so low, I knew the couple before us couldn’t hear. “It allows her to use her safe word while she’s gagged. If something happens and she needs to stop or slow the scene down, she’ll drop the bell.”

I moved forward slightly. Nathaniel had never used a gag on me before, and I was quite curious. I remembered Christine’s recommendation to tell Nathaniel to push me harder when I wanted and to bring up things I’d like to do.

While Paul went about collecting things from around the room, I kept my eyes on Christine. I would have thought she’d look vulnerable, and she did, but it wasn’t her vulnerability that drew me. It was the beauty of her trust, the grace of her submission. There was an elegance of sorts in her position I had not anticipated being there.

Paul came up behind her and ran a hand down her backside and again, the look in his eyes captured my attention. “You want this badly. I can tell.” He slid a vibrator into her, her moan muffled by the gag. “So needy already.”

My mind spun as it tried to take in what was happening before me. I tried to work my mind around the fact that the man who had made breakfast for me this morning was using a vibrator on his wife. In front of me. I couldn’t look away.

He started spanking her. The sound was light at first, but slowly grew in intensity. I wondered, briefly, how it would feel to be spanked while filled that way.

After a bit, my mind concentrated, not so much on what Paul was doing, but how the two of them looked. The way he completely focused his attention on her. The utter concentration of his expression. There was nothing in the world that existed in that moment for him except her, and I wondered again if Nathaniel looked the same when I gave myself to him.

His statement from earlier in the week came back to me. About how, for the wedding, he didn’t want to be in the mind frame required when I wore his collar, and I suddenly knew exactly what he meant. How intently he must have to work the entire weekend: to keep his focus and to plan all the necessary details. To make sure, above all, that I was okay and cared for at all times.

I shifted my attention to the couple before me, and while what they did was interesting—Paul had switched to a wooden paddle—it was the way they moved that captivated me. They looked to be dancing an intricate dance: his movement echoed and received by her. Her moans, in return, spurred him to further action. What played out before me was a give-and-take I had not expected, and the entire scene portrayed a delicate beauty I had not believed possible.

I was so engrossed in watching that give-and-take, I barely noticed when Paul picked up a flogger. I wanted to be Christine. Wanted it to be Nathaniel working hard to bring me the pleasure only he could. I wanted to play again, now that the image of how beautiful my submission must be was firmly embedded in my head.

Eventually Paul stopped, granted Christine permission to relax, and she dropped her head to the table. He removed both vibrator and gag, kissed her cheek, and whispered something to her we couldn’t hear. When she looked up at him, the love and trust in her eyes so touched me, I tightened my grasp on Nathaniel’s knee.

I thought back to our first weekend back in the playroom, when he’d cupped my chin and commanded me to look at him. Had I looked at him the same way Christine looked at Paul? Conversely, could I remember Nathaniel’s expression being as fierce and feral as Paul’s? It bothered me that I couldn’t recall it, and I made a promise to pay closer attention next time.

Paul told her to move to the the center of the room, and she slipped off the table to comply with his wishes. The middle of the room held what looked like a complex pulley-and-rope system. I leaned forward again, recognizing from Internet research the equipment needed for suspension scenes. Nathaniel didn’t have any of this in his playroom.

Paul took his time and slowly buckled Christine into what looked like boots, securing her to the ropes and pulleys hanging from the ceiling. It was obvious in watching them that they were a couple who had been together for years. There was no awkwardness, no hesitation, just control fully given and control fully assumed.

Once Christine was in position on the floor, Paul walked to a switch on a nearby wall. Within seconds, the pulley lifted her legs in the air and she rolled up—a smooth, practiced move she must have done many times. When her head hung a few feet off the ground, the pulley stopped. He walked to her, nodded, and she unbuckled his jeans.

I wanted to look away, but I was unable to do so. Then, right as I was trying to decide if I should close my eyes, just before Paul’s zipper opened, a soft scarf covered my eyes. Nathaniel whispered to me, “Sight isn’t the most important part of this scene.”

No, I wanted to yell as soon as I realized I’d be blindfolded for the foreseeable future. I want to see.

But I recalled the beauty and trust in Christine’s submission and knew I was submitting to my own master by wearing the blindfold. Knew he had his reasons. So I sat a bit straighter and concentrated on my other senses.

At first my sense of touch felt the most noticeable. The softness of the pillow under me. The movement of air around my bared belly. The hard bones and strong muscles of Nathaniel’s knee under my fingers. Even the silkiness of the blindfold.

Then came the sounds. The ragged intake of Paul’s breath as Christine did whatever it was she was doing. The whispery words of encouragement, too low to make out, but spoken in a tone I completely understood. From above me, the steady sound of Nathaniel’s breathing. Even my own heart. The once quiet room became a cacophony of noise.

I could no longer measure the passage of time with anything save my breaths and heartbeat. I tried to find something else and settled on the rhythmic sounds coming from the couple in front of me.

Christine let out a low whimper of pleasure, and I wondered what was happening. Then I recalled Nathaniel’s whisper and knew what was happening wasn’t what he wanted me to get from the experience.

You are brave and strong and fierce, he’d said in bed the night before.

I’d thought them to be romantic words, meant to soothe, to ease me into sleep. But hearing and experiencing the scene before me, they became so much more.

I saw Christine’s braveness in her supine position on the floor as she waited for Paul’s command.

I heard her strength in the sounds of Paul’s words as he softly encouraged her and eventually gave in to his own desires.

I felt the fierceness from both of them with emotions so fiery they damn near lit the playroom with their heat.

It’s you, I had whispered back to him. You let me be brave and strong and fierce. I’d meant it when I’d said it the night before, and I still believed the words to be true. Yet there was another facet added to my understanding, and as the couple before me continued, I sat in blinded awe of that knowledge.

Chapter Ten

—ABBY—

Nathaniel took my hand and I jumped at his touch, unprepared for the jolt of desire that accompanied his hand wrapping around mine. He placed my hand in my lap.

“Get in your waiting position,” he whispered, his husky voice sending another wave of longing through me.

I slipped off the pillow and moved into the position I took when in his playroom. While kneeling on the floor, I strained my ears, trying to hear what was happening. I hadn’t been in Paul’s playroom long enough to know what furniture Nathaniel was near, much less guess what he might be doing or getting.

And were Paul and Christine still in the room? Were they watching me? Nathaniel said he wouldn’t push my exhibitionism limits this weekend, but would this be considered exhibitionism? I mean, I was just kneeling.

I tried again to hear, to pick up on any voices, any whisper. Then it hit me—it didn’t matter. Didn’t matter what Nathaniel had planned. He was in control. I gave him that power, and to worry would be second-guessing him.

If Paul and Christine were in the room, I wanted my submission to be a mirror of what I had just seen play out before me. I realized then that I didn’t even care if Paul and Christine were in the room. I wanted them to see. Wanted to show them how proud I was to serve my master.

Bare feet padded to me.

“Stand up, Abigail,” Nathaniel said.

I scrambled as gracefully as possible to my feet, but the change in position, combined with the blindfold, disoriented me, and I swayed a bit.

He caught me, slipped his arms around my shoulders. “Steady, my lovely.” He didn’t move his hands, but kept his hold on me. “I need you to trust me.”

Yes. Anything.

“Paul and Christine have left. Only the two of us are in here.”

My heart pounded. We were alone. Alone. Oh, the things he could do when we were alone.

“You are to answer any question I ask immediately and honestly,” he said. “Understand?”

“Yes, Master.”

Master.

The word meant so much more now that I’d watched Paul and Christine.

Master.

I shivered in the new appreciation of its meaning. Every time I spoke it, I renewed my commitment to him. Reminded him I was with him by choice. Had given control to him. Confirmed I wanted him.

Had a six-letter word ever carried so much meaning?

He took my hand. “Come with me.”

We walked. I wasn’t sure where we were going. We weren’t leaving, were we? I didn’t want to leave. I wanted to stay in the playroom. I wanted Nathaniel to take me, to use me, to . . .

But it was his choice, and if he wanted us to leave, he’d have good reason.

He pulled us to a stop. I didn’t think it was near the door. It was hard to get my bearings, but I thought we were near the wall opposite the door.

“Undress,” he said, dropping my hand.

I’d undressed for him numerous times, as both his lover and his submissive, but it seemed different somehow. More intense.