Playing for Satisfaction [Satisfaction Texas 4] (Siren Publishing Ménage Everlasting) Read online

  Smack. Smack. Smack. She found herself sinking into the sensation, not even hearing his excited words at first.

  “Angel, you will not believe it. You remember that job I told you about, my dream job that I was sure I didn’t get?” Smack, smack, smack. “Well, I got it. They agreed to all my terms. Three-year contract with two optional years. My own lab so that I can work on my own research in my free time and own my own patents. They even offered to be my partner, but I prefer to be independent. And when you include the signing and annual bonuses, I’ll end up with almost half a million dollars.” Smack, smack, smack with the soft flogger now. “Do you know what I, what we, can do with that? I’ll be able to start my own company.”

  She could only grunt her answer, but she wanted to talk. She needed to talk, but the gag had taken away her voice. He was using the harder flogger now and she should be sinking into subspace now, but instead she was getting more and more tense. She knew he knew this, too, as he stopped more than once to stroke her ass and whisper sexy words into her ear.

  She finally relaxed a bit as she felt him raining blows down on her ass with the riding crop. He was wicked with that thing, occasionally aiming between her legs to strike her pussy and even her clit. She moaned, the last couple of hits finally sending her off to sweet oblivion, but then he started talking again.

  “I am sure you’ll be able to get a job out there. Apparently there’s quite a large group of expats in the Kingdom or maybe it’s an Emirate. I’m definitely going to have to study up so I don’t offend anyone. But anyway, there’s an American school there and I’m sure you could get a job there.” She was well and truly out of subspace now. What the hell was he talking about?

  “Now, I’m going to give you four easy strikes with the belt to get you used to the feel and then I’m going to give you two hard ones in the shape of an X. When I’m done, I’m going to fuck your brains out and you’ll have permission to come as often as you like.”

  She thought about safewording, but he’d been so excited about this. Ellie tried to force herself to relax. How bad could six strikes be? Surely she could take them to please him. She took a deep breath a second before she felt the impact of his belt. Then she screamed. These were the four easy ones?

  By the time he was finished, she was sobbing and not the least aroused. When he buried his cock inside her, she could tell he was shocked that she wasn’t ready for him. He pulled out and untied her. He massaged cream into her ass that seemed to numb the pain. Then he took her into his arms and held her close.

  “I’m sorry, I’m so sorry. We’ll never use the belt again. I promise,” he kept repeating. It took a while for her to realize that he thought he’d gone too far with her ass. She’d tried to explain that it was his announcement that they were moving halfway around the world that was the problem.

  “Oh, Angel. Is that the problem? I’m sorry I sprung it on you like that, but I was so excited. I can’t wait for us to start our lives together. They’re going to provide us with our own house and you’ll get a decorating allowance. I’m not fussy. Just make sure there’s a fully equipped playroom and I’ll be happy. I can’t wait to get you on a spanking horse and a bondage table and the St. Andrew’s cross. Hell, I’m going to want to spend so much time playing with you that I’m going to have a hard time getting my research done!” he teased.

  She was furious. No, furious didn’t begin to cover it. He’d ripped her heart out and stomped on it. She hated him. No, that wasn’t right. She had hated him. She was over him now. She was. She had moved on. He was just an unpleasant reminder of her past, like those jeans she hung onto that used to fit when she was sixteen. Intellectually she knew she’d never be able to wear them again, but she couldn’t bear to throw them out. No. Scratch that. He was nothing like those jeans. She loved those jeans. They represented good memories. He’d destroyed all their good memories when he’d had their marriage annulled.

  “I did not walk out.” His voice was calm and reasoned and she remembered how much she’d always hate the fact that he never seemed to get passionate or angry about anything. “I had a contract with an oil refinery in the Middle East. I told you before we got married that I’d applied for a number of jobs and that most of them were overseas because they paid the best. I told you about my dreams. The new extraction technology I was designing. But I needed money, lots of it, to finish my research and build a prototype and make it a reality, but I hadn’t even gotten a nibble from any of my job applications in Texas or, hell, anywhere else in the US or even Canada. The market was tough and while I had my master’s in engineering, I had limited field experience.

  “You broke my heart when you wouldn’t come with me. I admit I may have been hasty…”

  “Hasty? You asshole!” She was so angry she literally couldn’t speak another word so she just glared at him.

  “It was a magical summer, wasn’t it?” he continued, as if she hadn’t interrupted. “Maybe it was only a summer love but we were perfect together in bed. I taught you the joys of submission and Domination. We were perfect together in so many ways. The whole summer was perfect, right up until that final argument. Tell me I was wrong. You loved submitting to me. You loved me…as much as I loved you.”

  “I won’t lie. You were the first Master I ever submitted to and I loved it. And, yes, fine! I admit it. I loved you, too. But I was your wife. You couldn’t just uproot us without discussing it with me first. And then you just walked out on me without a word.”

  “I know and I loved you, too, Angel. But when I got the offer from Tri-Star International, it was like I had hit the jackpot. I had a wife I loved, a sub I worshipped, and now I had a high-paying job that would also fund my research. Angel, I told you, with that money from contract, I could turn my ideas into reality. They were worth millions, but I needed seed money. I knew once I could get them developed further and patented, I would be able to take care of you and our children like you deserved. I didn’t have a choice to say no. Besides, I asked you to come with me. It’s not like I was going to leave you behind.”

  “What kids? It was just the two of us. We should have figured it out together rather than you being so damned high-handed. And you didn’t ask me, you ordered me.

  “And yes, I understood that you hated being unemployed and didn’t want to live off your wife, but I figured that if you were proposing, that meant you would be looking for a job in the US. You knew I was from Texas. We talked about you moving to Kinsdale with me. I had some money. I would have given you every penny I had. And there were companies in West Texas…” Her voice trailed off for a moment. “Besides, I told you that I had a contract, too, to teach school. What made your contact more important than mine?”

  “I never said it was. But your contract was only for a year. You could have come out and joined me after the year was up. Besides, compared to what I could make in West Texas, this was a fortune. They were willing to pay a premium for my services. When the contract is over, I’d have enough money to get my prototype built and after that, the sky was the limit. I figured it was close to a sure thing, but nothing is guaranteed, and I sure wasn’t going to risk your money in case it failed.”

  “I just wanted to teach, Bram. You knew I didn’t care about money. You knew that. I was planning on teaching high school. That’s not a career you get into if all you care about is money. And as for going with you to the Middle East…You knew I’d just accepted a job and signed the contract. I’d put a down payment down on my house and taken out a mortgage. Besides, you couldn’t even guarantee I could work there if I went with you. Dammit, Bram. You never even asked. You just announced that’s what I was going to do. I was your submissive, but not your slave.”

  “You were also my wife!”

  She ignored his interruption. “You just couldn’t order me to uproot my life like that. Besides, we hardly knew each other outside the bedroom.”

  “You knew me well enough to marry me!”

  “I was young and stup
id. We both were!”

  “You were twenty-seven and I was twenty-nine. We were hardly kids.”

  “Getting married was a mistake.”

  “What should we have done? Just fucked for a few weeks and said our good-byes?”

  “Maybe that’s what we should have done!”

  “Yes, well, you are my wife, and more importantly my sub, and I’ve come to claim you and take you home.”

  “You and what army?” she snorted. “I told you. You are the one that had the marriage annulled. You are the one who filed the damned papers!” Ellie felt her heart breaking all over again.

  The fight had escalated and, in the end, Ellie had stormed out and back to her own room. She hadn’t used it since they met, but she’d never given it up and most of her things were still in there. The worst part was watching the eyes of her students following her down the hallway. Luckily, she didn’t have far to go. Ironically, their rooms were next door to each other. When she lay down on her own bed, she realized that they were only a couple of pieces of sheetrock apart but that might has well have been the other side of the world.

  For the next two days, they were both so busy that their paths rarely crossed. She was busy marking papers and winding down the class while he alternated between finishing his own course work and preparing to move overseas.

  It all came to a head the evening before the last day. They’d tried to talk but it had ended in a fight that took place in the hallway between their two rooms. They’d both yelled. Then he had slapped a piece of paper with his new address, and his wedding band, down on the hall table before giving her an ultimatum.

  In anger, Ellie had tugged off the beautiful wedding and engagement rings that had belonged to his grandmother, yelling at the closed door, that she wasn’t keeping them, because they were about love and respect and he clearly had neither feeling for her. He came out and shouted that if she didn’t want them anymore, she knew where to send them before announcing that he needed a drink and stomped away.

  Angry beyond reason, she threw them down on the papers beside his ring and stomped off to her own room.

  At first she cried and then she sobbed and then she’d lain dry-eyed in bed tossing and turning for hours, it seemed, before making a decision. She’d vowed for better or for worse and now, at the first challenge, they were failing in their vows. Her finger felt so empty without his rings, but that was just a metaphor for how her life would be without him.

  This was his dream job, she knew that, and his field had much fewer opportunities than hers did. She was hurt that he hadn’t seemed to really understand what she’d have to give up to be with him. They had something special and she wasn’t going to throw it all away over a single fight. She would swallow her pride and go with him. It might take some time for the school board to find a replacement, but she’d tell him she’d join him as soon as she could.

  She heard him return around three, and hoped he was sober, or at least sober enough to talk to. He normally wasn’t much of a drinker, but his steps hadn’t seemed steady. Throwing on a robe, she opened her door and went to knock on his door. Before she did, she decided to put her rings back on. If he had passed out, she’d slip into bed and surprise him, she decided.

  Smiling, she looked down on the hall table. The rings were gone but the paper with his address was still there. What did that mean? She felt herself going hot and then cold. She felt herself shivering. Had he changed his mind? Had he decided he didn’t want to be married after all?

  She was so confused and hurt. Maybe he had just taken them into her room so they wouldn’t be lost, she told herself. She never should have left them on the table. With a heavy heart, she knocked on his door. When he didn’t answer, she let herself in. It was empty. His bags were gone. She hurried inside and looked around. Maybe he left a note or something, but the room was empty and her heart was well and truly broken.

  Chapter 5

  She’d alternately raged at Bram and at herself when he’d walked out so soon after their marriage. She’d gone back and forth for almost two weeks before she finally decided to try to break her teaching contract. Their marriage deserved a real shot. The first week was the start of the school year and she’d been so busy she’d just fallen into bed exhausted every night. It was that first weekend that she’d missed him the most. She was having such an amazing, wonderful experience and wished he was around to share it. By the end of the second week, she knew that as much as she loved her job, she loved him more.

  She was still mad at his high-handedness, but he had applied for the jobs before they’d decided to marry. They’d both rushed into things and made assumptions. She’d assumed that since he wasn’t working, he’d move with her to Kinsdale where she was going to be teaching.

  But since that wasn’t possible, she would make this sacrifice, she decided on Friday night as she sat alone staring at the television. She’d give their marriage a chance. Surely she’d be able to get a job over there. There was some kind of school of English-speaking children, wasn’t there? She would teach there or even just volunteer if there were no paying jobs, she’d decided.

  And then the Saturday morning mail delivery had brought the papers and it was like she’d been stabbed in the heart again. Getting the annulment documents had shocked her and saddened her and infuriated her. Hell. That was underplaying it. She’d felt like her heart had been ripped out. If he’d been standing in front of her, she’d have stabbed him with the letter opener. Her one small consolation had been that she hadn’t yet sent in her resignation.

  She didn’t even bother getting a lawyer. She’d signed the papers and mailed them back to him. Then spent the weekend crying her eyes out and binging on Chunky Monkey. If it hadn’t been for Clyde and his needs, she wouldn’t even have left the house. She’d found the starving young pup one morning on the way to work. She’d only planned on keeping him until she could find him a permanent home but as the days and then weeks went by, she knew that he was hers and she was his.

  And regardless of how crappy she felt, Clyde had needed to be walked and then he’d needed food and there were no dog food delivery services, so she’d gone to the grocery store. She’d stocked up on her favorite ice cream as well. On Sunday, she walked Clyde past Candy’s Diner and the weather was so nice, she decided to have lunch on the patio. Candy, whom she’d known since middle school, had taken one look in her card and had immediately diagnosed a broken heart.

  Candy had helped her through things, too, but even Candy didn’t know about the marriage. No one did. Ellie had kept that humiliation to herself, at least. Candy had just thought that Ellie’s boyfriend had walked out. The two of them had eaten ice cream together and watched sappy movies and Ellie had cried her pain out.

  Afterward Ellie had felt a little bit better. And with the help of Clyde and Candy and her other friends, she’d begun to heal. She’d thought of tossing the letter out, but she didn’t want to see it again and especially didn’t want to see the box with her collar and rings, so she left them both in the back of her dresser drawer vowing that someday she’d get rid of them both. Someday when she was ready. What if she had resigned before receiving the annulment papers? She couldn’t bear to consider the thought.

  Then she’d settled back down to work. She applied for and been accepted to a PhD program. She was now working on her thesis, the last step to her becoming Dr. Maine and maybe impressing her family just a bit.

  * * * *

  Between teaching and her own studies, she’d been damned busy. In fact, until she’d started seeing Ren, she’d lived like a damned nun. Men were just to be hustled for a game of pool. She never got close to any, not until Ren. He supported her work and her studies. Besides being mayor, which was just a part-time position, he was also a lawyer with a busy practice. He was also a Dom.

  This time, she’d taken things slowly and so had he. At first, they hung out and argued about municipal issues. First it had been sanitation and then zoning and then the school boa
rd. He’d argued that although she lived in Satisfaction, she taught in Kinsdale, so Satisfaction educational matters were none of her concern. She’d soon set him straight. Now it was dogs.

  She actually found their sparring refreshing and intriguing. He didn’t treat her like a delicate little doll or a student or any kind of lesser being because she was a woman. Intellectually, they were well matched, even if they were on opposite sides of certain issues. It was exhilarating.

  She’d realized gradually that things were changing between them a few weeks after the dog debate. They’d had another two lunches together and one dinner. This time, they’d decided to meet up at The Whips and Spurs saloon for a drink. They had ended up arguing over college football. They even made a bet on the game and she lost. His prize was to spank her. She’d shocked them both when she’d suggested doing it in the private BDSM club in the back of the saloon to receive her spanking.

  “What’s the problem? I know you are a Dom and have a membership. I’ve seen you back there.”

  “You’re a sub? I don’t remember ever seeing you play.”

  “I’ve only had one Dom, but that was a long time ago. I don’t go often and when I do, it’s mostly just to watch. But come to think of it, I haven’t seen you in the club in a long time. Let your membership lapse or are you too good for the club now that you are mayor?”

  “Got it in one. Not the ‘too good to play there’ part of your statement. Since I don’t have a permanent sub, I don’t think it looks good for the mayor to be playing with the unattached subs, so yes, I go into El Paso when I want to play.”