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Her eyes widened as she placed a hand on Nick’s arm. “Oh, my god, Nick. Mistress Ella—she’s one of the owners—have you met her?” Without giving Nick a chance to reply, Sophia rushed on, “She branded her slave girl, Maya, right in front of us!”
Nick instantly visualized Sophia naked and bent at the waist over a tall stool. How she would tremble as the red-hot poker moved closer and closer to her flesh. How she would scream as the fiery metal seared deep into her skin. While his brain instantly rejected even the possibility, his perverse cock tingled, his balls tightening at the thought of delivering such extreme erotic pain. But aloud, all he said was, “That sounds intense.”
“Yeah, it totally was,” Sophia agreed, unaware of his dark imaginings. “First, she just talked for a while about safety and consent issues, and then she did a demo on a potato and let us all try it. It’s harder than it looks. And then, she showed us the iron poker with the brand design Maya had commissioned from this BDSM branding site—a heart with Mistress Ella’s initials inside it. You have to heat it up with a propane torch to exactly the right temperature—too hot and you can injure muscle tissue or cause too much scarification—too little heat, and the brand won’t set properly. One of the guys watching passed out when Mistress Ella did the actual branding.”
“Whoa. How did Maya handle it?” Nick asked, back in control of his dark fantasies. He remembered the petite blonde who had checked them in upon arrival.
“Like a champ,” Sophia said. “She didn’t make a sound. It’s like she was in another dimension or something—some kind of submissive meditative thing—it was awesome to watch. It’s not her first brand, either. She and Mistress Ella have been together for over ten years, apparently, and they’re legally married and everything. They’re both way into heavy erotic pain—Mistress Ella on the giving end, of course,” Sophia added with a grin.
“You’re pretty good at taking erotic pain,” Nick offered, his cock hardening at the thought of flicking a single tail over her curvaceous ass. “Are you thinking of getting a brand?”
Sophia hugged herself, a shudder moving through her frame as she shook her head. “No way,” she said emphatically. “I’ll stick to marks that fade after a day or two, thanks.”
“Brands are definitely permanent,” Nick agreed. “Even more so than a tattoo—you can’t get a brand lasered off. You’re stuck with it.”
“Yep. It’s for life. I can’t imagine that level of commitment.”
“Agreed,” Nick replied staunchly.
He’d spent most of his adult life avoiding commitment. He’d dated plenty, and there were lots of available women, both in and out of the scene. Yet, even with women who’d lasted longer than a few months, he’d always kept his metaphorical bags packed, one eye on the door. He told himself it wasn’t fair to expect some woman to sit around at home waiting for him all the time. His work always came first. At least until he’d made his first million.
Yet, he’d made that, and quite a bit more besides, but nothing had changed. He was too driven—his focus on finding the opportunities others had missed, gathering the resources necessary to make it happen, and achieving his goals.
Now he was forty—perhaps midway through his life—and what did he have to show for it, other than more money than he knew what to do with? Thinking about Mistress Ella and Maya, and the incredible level of commitment they must share, his heart did a strange sort of twist. Imagine loving someone so much you would want to claim them in such a permanent way. What would it be like to give your heart so completely to another?
He was saved from further introspection by the arrival of their meal. Dinners in the formal dining room were family-style, the menu selected by the chef. Along with a delicious green salad and fresh bread, that night they were offered Cornish game hen stuffed with mushrooms and wild rice, or a vegetarian lasagna. Nick had chosen the hen, Sophia the lasagna.
Over homemade lemon-ginger ice cream, Nick said, “So, you ready to hear about the surprise?”
Sophia grinned, her dimples making small crescent moons in her cheeks. “About time. I was starting to think you were going to make me pull it out of you. I had an internal bet going with myself on how long I would last without demanding to know.”
“So, who won the bet?” Nick asked, cocking an eyebrow and trying not to laugh.
She paused a moment and then, still grinning, asserted, “I did, naturally. But since you brought it up, now you have to tell me. Tell me, tell me, tell me,” she added with comic eagerness.
Nick grinned back, anticipating the fun ahead. “I was able to reserve the vacuum bed chamber from eight thirty to nine thirty this evening.” He fixed her with an intent gaze. “You ever tried a vacuum bed?”
