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She rocked back as Julen tugged on her from behind, and Ilias gave her fingers a little squeeze. “You’re doing beautifully.”
She looked up, smiling softly. “Thank you, Sir.”
“Okay, you’re good to go.” Julen went back to Nomiki, who was getting a more complex tie.
Ilias released her hands. “Any tingling?”
“No, Sir.”
He circled behind her, examining the anchor point Julen had created on the back of the chest harness.
Ilias grabbed the remaining elbow rope, which he’d left as long tails when he finished tying. He began to wrap the loose rope around the loops stretched between her arms. He worked slowly and carefully, making sure the strands lay perfectly next to one another as he wrapped them. There was something meditative about the process, and he began to understand the appeal of the complex rope weaves people like Julen favored.
When he was done with what he’d been told was a Lark’s head double column tie, he checked for the tightness by sliding two fingers under the rope on each arm, then stepped back to examine his handiwork. The rope essentially formed a spreader bar between her elbows. It not only prevented her from bringing her arms forward, but the thick coil of rope created by wrapping prevented her from bringing her elbows any closer together behind her back.
“It was right after he died.”
Josslyn’s words were quiet, unexpected. Ilias paused, considering his next move. He could stop and listen, or he could keep going and listen. After a moment of consideration, he circled around to her front, then gripped her waist and eased her off the table.
He could feel her watching him, feel the anxiety rolling off her in waves. He dropped to his knees and grabbed the next coil of rope.
“Spread your legs shoulder width apart,” he instructed.
Josslyn carefully spread her feet, her shoulders now relaxed, and Ilias started on the hip harness.
“I thought I was mostly done with the grief process because I’d pre-grieved. It’s weird when you know someone is dying. I was in denial for a long time because he was young. He couldn’t die of heart disease, right?”
Ilias nodded as he looped natural rope around her thigh in a garter.
“But he did die. And it was tragic and awful, but at the same time, a few months after his funeral, I realized I was free. God, that sounds bad.”
Josslyn shifted her weight foot to foot. Ilias reached down and wrapped his hand around her ankle, squeezing gently. She stilled. Something inside him clenched tight at how responsive she was to him. A single touch was enough to remind her that he was here, and he was in control of the situation, so she didn’t have to be.
He was probably reading too much into it. He had no way of knowing exactly how she interpreted the touch. He went back to tying rope.
“I don’t mean free of him because I didn’t want that. I mean I was free to try things.”
“To get your needs met.” He carefully wound rope around her torso just below her belly button.
“Yes.” There was relief in her voice. “Exactly. It was almost like I was trying to find the bright side to his death. And we talked about how I felt like a burden because I wanted him to be a Dom, my Dom.”
“We did.”
“So, it made sense that I find someone to top me.”
Personally, Ilias thought that her husband should have been more than just her Dom, but her Master. That was not to say that kinksters who married one another had to live the lifestyle twenty-four seven. Ilias’s definition of the difference between Dom and Master was all about the level of trust and understanding. He’d admittedly never been married, but he assumed that a marriage meant there was complete trust. If a woman trusted a man enough to allow him to be her husband, she should also trust him enough to call him “Master.”
But from what he knew of Josslyn’s husband, the man probably didn’t want, and therefore didn’t deserve, that title or the responsibility.
Unfair of him, since the man wasn’t around to defend himself, but Ilias wasn’t concerned with fair. He was concerned with the damage the man had done to this beautiful woman.
“I didn’t tell you the full truth when I said after my husband died, I met Master Mikel and joined the club. I left a middle step out.”
Ilias made a last knot, tucked in the ties on the front of the harness and rose to his feet.
Josslyn’s chin was tucked down against her chest. He notched a finger under it and raised her face. She kept her gaze down. He let her do it, sliding his hand so he cupped the side of her neck, but not forcing her head up.
“I found someone on the internet. Not on a fetish friendly website or forum. A hookup app.”
