DeVante's Coven (25 page)

“True,” Roderick agreed. “But I know what I’m looking for isn’t here. Not even sure if she dances anymore. But thanks for the info.”

They walked. Tony complained, mildly, but Roderick hated taking taxis, and the weather was fair, and they had time. That was the thing, Roderick always felt like there was time. If it takes too long, well, we can come back tomorrow. Or the tomorrow after that. Or after that. Always time. He did tend to forget the impatience of mortals, and Tony exhibited his own impatience by grabbing Roderick’s arm and picking up his pace.

“What’s the rush? It’s only a mile or so.”

“I want to get back to Lily. I want to get on with my life. I want to get on with something.”

Club Paradise was a much classier joint. Tony knew immediately that if Callum was in the skin business, he’d be found at a place like this.

The décor was red and black velvet, corny and lush all at the same time, lighting low and romantic, an effect created by red bulbs recessed into the ceiling. There were low black tables with plush red and black chairs arranged around them—wow, talk about a table dance. At this table the girl would be close enough to smell.

Even the walls were velvet-covered, muting all sound and leaving only “hush” in the air.

Lush, plush, and hush, Tony thought, that pretty much summed up the atmosphere.

They walked a turn around the place, Tony gaping at each little detail designed to maintain a feeling of sensuality, like full-breasted silhouettes in red on black velvet walls… the whole place oozed,
if you’re gonna be in the sex business, you might as well go all the way
.

Roderick walked up to the bar, signaled the bartender, and asked, “If you wanted to hire some girls for a private party who would you see, provided it’s an available service?”

The bartender looked at Roderick without expression. “You buyin’ anything?”

“Of course,” Roderick answered immediately, and ordered drinks. The barkeep poured the drinks and Roderick paid him twice what the guy said he owed. The bartender smiled and said, “You’d need to talk to Mr. Callum about that, but he’s not in tonight. I suggest you drink some, tip the dancing girls handsomely, then come back tomorrow.”

It was almost ten o’clock. Roderick nudged Tony’s shoulder and said, “Let’s go watch the purty ladies.” Tony could hear laughter in his voice.

***

Daniel was relaxed against him, stroking his skin absently, and Reed didn’t know if he was thinking about the question he’d asked, or just drifting into sleep. Reed held the boy in loose arms and reflected on his own voyage into the culture of dominance and submission. He’d only been here in California a short time when he discovered the foreign world of the leather bar. He’d been so young then, and impossibly caught between hopeless naivety and jaded cynicism. The first time he watched someone in the bar get whipped, he was both terrified and thrilled, completely mind-fucked that anyone would allow themselves to be put on display like that, their every twitch, every cry, entertainment for an audience. Some of them even ejaculated, eliciting hoots and hollers from the patrons. My God, Reed had thought, how would a person stand it?

But then he found himself there watching every single night, at first wondering if he’d be a master or a slave. After a few nights, he decided he’d be a master, not knowing that a good master must first be a good slave. Certainly not knowing that were he to attempt to be a master, his repressed grief might evolve into a rage and cause damage to someone at his mercy. No, he didn’t understand these things at first, just understood that he craved the high he got watching the whip-master work magic on the slave.

But the whip-master understood all these things, and he understood the nameless void inside Reed that left him hollow with longing for something he could never express.

Reed had been showing up at the bar nightly for two solid weeks when the whip-master approached him. “I have an empty slot tonight. Why don’t you fill it?”

Reed knew that shock and fear showed in his face. “Me? No thanks.” But his pulse sped up, and he felt his armpits growing wet, and he glanced nervously at the ‘gallows’—where the slaves were tied to take their whipping. He took a desperate sip from his drink that did nothing for his dry mouth.

“You think I don’t know what you want? You’ve been here every night.”

Reed turned terrified eyes on him, his voice a desperate plea. “I want to be
you
.”

The whip-master smiled and slung an arm across Reed’s shoulders, turning him to face the gallows. “Sure you do. But first you have to be
him
,” and he pulled Reed away from the bar, past the gallows, and into the shadows of stage right, the noise of the bar falling away.

He steered Reed backstage and handed him over to two well-built young men dressed only in silver-studded leather straps, leather jocks, and black knee boots. They could have been twins. “Here’s a virgin, on in five. Get him ready.”

Reed was ready, all right, ready to bolt for the door, the street, the world, never to return to this place, but the two young men literally took him in their hands, one holding each of Reed’s arms, not tightly, but with a graceful knowing that coaxed Reed into accepting the inevitable.

He was going to hang from the gallows tonight.

They quickly stripped him down to his shorts, and Reed realized he had never paid attention to what the poor bastard being whipped was wearing. He almost started to laugh, except one of the men kneeled and pulled Reed’s shorts down and off, and gripped his soft scared cock, pulling on it, breathing on it, smoothing his hand up the inside of Reed’s thigh with a light tantalizing touch. When Reed started to get hard the man quickly buckled leather cuffs with short chains to Reed’s ankles.

The other man appeared in front of him with some sort of lid-less jar in his hands. He gathered some of the jar’s contents into his hands, and reached around Reed to smooth it into the skin of his back. It was thick, like soft butter. The one who’d removed his shorts rubbed the same cream into his legs and buttocks, then stood and kissed him on the mouth, whispering, “The safe word is ‘September.’ Say it, and it’s all over. You’re going to be incredible,” and he slipped his tongue between Reed’s lips. The other smoothed the cream with sure hands onto Reed’s chest. Reed’s only thought at that point was he was glad he wasn’t a particularly hairy man. Then the young men stood on either side of him, each fastening a leather cuff with a large ring to Reed’s wrists, petting him and murmuring in calm, quiet voices. Reed knew the whip-master would make an announcement, tell some little story of why Reed needed to be punished, but he didn’t hear any of it over the hammering of his heart and the rushing in his ears. He knew only that suddenly the twins were leading him onto the stage and quickly snapping the clips from the gallows chains to his wrist cuffs and the chains of his ankle cuffs to rings bolted into the floor. Then they adjusted the length of the gallows chains so Reed’s body was stretched taught between his wrists and the floor. Reed realized the set-up forced him to lean forward just enough that without support he would fall over. He had to fight gravity with his shoulders and back or his body would sag toward the floor. He never even looked at the crowd in the bar, the people who were watching. It never occurred to him that they were even there.

The first taste of his punishment was such a shock that it ripped a scream from his throat. He wondered for a split second what type of torturous instrument could possibly cause such incredible pain, but then the next blow came and he was screaming again and trying to twist away, and unable to think anything at all. Then each searing pain led right into the next and his screams subsided to moans, and gasps, and choking sobs; tears streaming from his eyes. He had no idea if it lasted for one minute or fifty. All concept of time and reality faded away and there was only the thrumming pain, the dripping sweat, and the salt of his tears filling his mouth.

He went back the next night, and the next. Then skipped a night here and there but still showed up regularly. And the selection process now became clear to him—there was no sign-up sheet, just one of two dungeon masters roaming the bar collecting victims. It was always the same master that came for Reed, and he learned he could shake his head and say, “Not tonight,” if he just wasn’t up for the emotional fall-out he went through afterward. Being whipped with a single-tail brought him literally to his knees. But more often than not, he went when the master chose him, because somehow the master always seemed to know exactly what Reed needed.

And Reed never did play the role of master. The whip-master who’d coaxed him to the gallows that first time had been dead-on right about Reed’s role.

Reed had been numb long before moving to San Francisco, moving through each day on autopilot, never managing to grieve for anything—not Aidan, not his failed marriage, certainly not his abandoned youth.

But the flogger or the whip biting into his skin—he felt that, and he let loose and cried, let his heart break under the skillful ministration of the master.

It became his grief therapy.

For almost a year he went to that bar more often than he didn’t. For almost a year he allowed himself to feel the pain, to be punished for his sins.

And then he started feeling happy; sometimes he even caught himself laughing out loud with Maggie, completely engaged in life.

And when he realized he was living again, he didn’t go to that particular bar anymore.

Reed didn’t think Daniel had sins to atone for, or a craving to be punished. If Daniel had liked Leonard’s mastery over him, it would be for different reasons than Reed’s had been. Maybe Daniel just needed to learn to let go. And Reed might be able to teach him.

Reed let out a short laugh, then lifted Daniel’s chin so their eyes met. “Yes, but usually there’s more to it than that. What happened inside your head, your heart?”

Daniel looked thoughtful for a moment, and Reed found that preferable to his being embarrassed and shy.

“Well, I guess just not being in charge of what happens,” he eventually said. “I mean, it wasn’t that long ago I lived with my parents and had to follow their rules, live up to their expectations. And when I didn’t, they cut me loose. So then I lived with a friend, and the rules were all internal—remember to be a straight boy, don’t say this, don’t talk about that, or someone will figure out you’re lying. The only way to appear to be as normal as everyone else, was to hold tight to that control, keep the act going.”

“But what about Roderick? You didn’t have to keep the act up with him.”

“No, but there were other forces at work there. There was no doubt he was in control—even if he didn’t make me follow any particular rules, there was always the terror that if I disappointed him he’d abandon me and I’d be stuck someplace where I didn’t know anybody, didn’t have any money… and… and how stupid is this… I’d have to figure out a way to
take care of myself.
So I followed him. I went where he wanted to go and tried to be everything he wanted me to be. He’d made some terrific speech about how he loved watching me respond and react to things, how I was both wise and child-like… but I think in the end he only wanted me because he found me beautiful.”

“You’re not hard to look at, you know.”

Daniel’s smile was wry. “I know. But it’s not a redeeming quality. It’s certainly not a reason to let someone follow you right out of their fucking life. And honestly—I think he expected to get tired of me eventually, and then he would’ve killed me.”

“Well, now I have to be myself. I mean, sure, DeVante has a rule or two, but his main thing is that I stay out of his face, stay out of his business, and don’t ask him for too much. Get myself home before sunrise. And other than that there’s just… nothing. I’m on my own. And I don’t know who or what to be. I’m lost.”

“And Leonard found you?”

Daniel shook his head, his soft blond hair tickling Reed’s chin. “Not exactly, but he made me realize that I
could
be found… by someone… by you.”

Reed smoothed his fingers over Daniel’s skull. “I don’t do that kind of thing.”

But his cock sprang to life, hard against Daniel’s hip, and though the boy made no comment, his hand crept under the sheet to wrap around it.

Daniel tilted his head to look at Reed, then quickly looked away. His voice, when it came, was strong, sure. “I bet you could. I bet you’d be good at it.”

Daniel was essentially asking Reed to take him over, asking Reed to lead him into unknown territory, take control. Reed stood at the precipice of the incredible power shift Daniel was offering and decided to leap... knowing that yes, he could take Daniel halfway there, but Daniel would have to give himself—all of himself—to get the rest of the way. And only then could Reed master him completely.

His thoughts were suddenly racing with time-lines and possibilities. It had to start carefully… and then build until Daniel realized just how much he had to give up. And Reed would have to be cautious, because as he stretched Daniel’s limits he would also be finding his own.

What Daniel thought he was asking for was a night of playful bondage; but if Reed was going to play, he was going to play for keeps.