Rachel Haimowitz & Cat Grant - [Power Play 1] (12 page)

“All right.” He stood, rubbing his palms on his jeans.

Jonathan stood with him, put a hand on his shoulder. Brandon

flinched again, but Jonathan supposed he’d expected that after the

evening they’d just had. At least Brandon hadn’t tried to push him

away.

CHAPTER
8

ne bag. Don’t bother with clothes; I’ll take care of that.

Bran looked around his apartment, battered duffel bag in hand.

If he couldn’t pack clothes, what the hell else was there?
Toiletries, I

guess.
He wandered into the bathroom, grabbed his toothbrush, his

razor, his comb, his deodorant. Which still left . . . 99 percent of the

bag to fill.

He couldn’t decide if it was Zen or just pathetic that he had

nothing else in this place he didn’t want to leave behind for six

months.

Well, okay,
one
thing. He snatched the picture of his mother

off his dresser—one of the only things he’d managed to take with

him when his dad had thrown him out—wrapped it carefully in his

favorite ratty old Henley, and put it in the duffel. Grabbed his dog-

eared copy of
Huck Finn
to go along with it. Not that Jonathan had

any shortage of books, but his mom had given him this one, and he’d

re-read it at least a dozen times in the years since she’d died. He took

a long look around the bedroom, but nothing else called out to him.

Same in the living room/kitchenette. He felt kind of silly carrying a

nine-tenths empty duffel, but one long last look around the apartment

revealed nothing else with which to fill it.

He heaved a sigh, told himself he wasn’t wistful or worried in the

slightest, and walked out the door.

Jonathan’s driver was waiting for him in the parking lot, limo

idling weirdly quiet at the curb. He climbed into the backseat before

he could second-guess himself.

At Jonathan’s building, the security guard ushered him straight to

the penthouse elevator, then punched the button. Thirty-four floors

never ticked by so slowly. Jonathan was waiting for him on the other

side of the door, smiling, hands in his pockets. Well, of course—what

did
he
have to be nervous about?

He supposed it shouldn’t have come as such a surprise when the

first thing out of Jonathan’s mouth wasn’t “Hello” or “How are you

tonight,” but “Strip.”

Bran stepped out of the elevator and dropped his bag to the floor.

“W-what?”

Jonathan gestured at him with an open hand. “Strip, please. All

your clothes. Leave them where you stand.”

Jesus, he wasn’t serious?

But that no-nonsense look in his eyes made it clear he was.

Well, it wasn’t as if Bran hadn’t known what he was getting into,

even if he could feel the humiliation burning straight up to the tips

of his hair. He took a deep breath, reached up with shaking fingers—

Really, Bran? Trembling like a little kid?
—and began to unbutton his

shirt.And then it hit him . . . “Wait, don’t you have a live-in maid?”

“And a cook, and a driver, too. Nothing they haven’t seen before.

Anyway, they have their own suites downstairs.”

“But they don’t . . .?”

“Join in?” Now Jonathan smiled. “No, definitely not. I’m afraid

I’m really quite selfish; only child, you know.”
He made another

impatient waving gesture and said, “Sometime tonight, please?”

All right, don’t think about it, just do it.

Shirt first, then he toed off his sneakers and socks and unbuttoned

his jeans. Skinned them down and stepped out of them, leaving his

boxers behind.

Jonathan raised an eyebrow in the general direction of Bran’s

crotch and folded his arms across his chest. “I said
all
your clothes.

You’re new to this, I know, so I’ll try my very best to be patient, but

let me make this clear right from the start: I expect to be obeyed,

without hesitation or question, and I
do not
like to repeat myself.

When you make me do things I don’t like, I’m afraid I’ll have to do

things
you
don’t like in return. Do you understand?”

Bran thought back to all those implements of torture in the

dungeon and barely repressed a shudder.
You can do this, Bran. Think

of the money . . .

Jonathan slapped his cheek. Not hard, didn’t particularly hurt,

but
holy shit did he just
slap
me?

Bran touched his cheek, realized his mouth was hanging open

and closed it. Jonathan sighed as if he were dealing with some idiot

child. “What did I just say?” he asked, and despite the slap that

had preceded the question, the question itself came out infinitely

patient.

Which was a good thing, because try though he might, Bran

couldn’t seem to remember. “I, uh . . .” He cleared his throat, tried to

stick his hands in his pockets and realized he had none anymore. It

was cold in here; he shivered.

A warm hand landed on his shoulder. Gentle, soft. “It’s all right,”

Jonathan said. “I know how overwhelming it can be at first. So I’ll

say this one more time. I expect to be obeyed without question or

delay, and this is the last time I’ll
ever
repeat myself without taking

it out of your hide. One demerit for every infraction—more for the

particularly egregious ones—starting now.”

Bran shuddered beneath that gentle touch, that deceptively gentle

voice and the talk of demerits. Jonathan wasn’t shitting around, this

was for
real
. He glanced back at the elevator door, really
thought

about it for a second, but . . .
Three million dollars, Bran. Suck it up.

“Take off your boxers.”

Strange, how easy it was this time. Not like Jonathan hadn’t

seen all of him already anyway. He hooked his thumbs beneath the

waistband and pulled them down, kicked them a few feet to the side.

He met Jonathan’s approving gaze and said, “Now what?”

“Now, rule #2. Never speak out of turn. If I ask you a question, I

expect an immediate, honest answer. If you need time to think, you

may tell me so, but
don’t
leave me waiting. If you have something

you’re dying to say and I’ve not asked you a question, you may ask

me for permission to speak. I may or may not grant that permission.

Understand?”

Bran nodded. He’d learned how to keep his mouth shut after his

mother died.

Yet Jonathan’s gaze narrowed. Fuck, had he done something

wrong already?

“When I ask you a question,” Jonathan said, “I expect you to

answer me out loud unless I’ve gagged you.”
Gagged
him? What the

fuck
? “Understand?”

“Um, yes, sir?”

A little smile broke out on Jonathan’s mouth (that
gorgeous fucking

mouth
, damn him all to hell), and he said, “And for God’s sake, don’t

call me sir. Jonathan, all right? Just Jonathan.”

Bran felt a little smile break across his own mouth.
Or maybe

Ocean Windsong, you little fuck?
He held back his snort and said

instead, “Yes, Jonathan.”

Silence then for a time, as Jonathan looked him up and down,

studied him like he’d never seen a naked body before. Kinda strange,

but as long as Jonathan wasn’t taking him downstairs, he wasn’t gonna

complain.

Jonathan reached out and brushed fingertips across a two-inch

scar high up on Bran’s left pec: the one he didn’t like to think about

if he could help it. Thankfully, Jonathan didn’t ask about it. Didn’t

ask—or say—anything, actually, and really, how long was he gonna

leave him standing here, naked and shivering in the foyer?

Or was this a test? Just waiting for Bran to say something right

after he’d told him he couldn’t? Well, fuck that; he wasn’t that

stupid.

“You’re quite the fidgeter, aren’t you,” Jonathan said through

that familiar smug smile of his, dragging the fingertips of both hands

across Bran’s flanks.

Well, yeah, when you’re
tickling
me, fucker.
But oh, wait, he was

supposed to answer out loud, wasn’t he? “I dunno,” he said. “Guess I

never really noticed.”

“I don’t know,
Jonathan
,” Jonathan corrected.

Bran grimaced—
Really? You’re
really
gonna make me do that?
—

but repeated flatly, “I don’t know,
Jonathan
.”

That seemed to satisfy. Jonathan nodded and said, “Well, I

can’t have a fidgety sub. We’ll have to work on breaking you of that

habit.”

Great. Just great.

“Follow me, then.”

He turned and headed for the stairs without waiting for a

confirmation from Bran, and for a moment, Bran’s feet seemed glued

to the floor. To the dungeon . . . he was taking him to the dungeon

already
? Did he mean to start . . . to start
breaking
him now?

“Keep up!” Jonathan singsonged as he headed down the first

stair, “Or I’ll put you on a leash!”

Smug fucker.
Effective, though; next Bran knew, he was hustling

after Jonathan like some simpering dog, anxious not to be kicked.

Jonathan led them down the hall to the dungeon, unlocked the

door, and beckoned Bran inside. Bran’s gaze zeroed in on a set of shiny

metal cuffs laid out on a table near the door, one pair slightly larger

than the other, four inch-wide O-rings welded to each of them by

tiny little U-bolts. Jonathan pocketed the door key and said, “Hold

out your wrists.”

Bran didn’t move. Did Jonathan really mean to lock him in those

things? Worse, what would he do
to him after? “Uh . . .”

“For the record, I hadn’t planned to inflict the slightest discomfort

on you today, but now you’ve just earned yourself
two
punishments:

one for speaking out of turn, and one for not obeying immediately.

Would you like to make it three, or would you like to hold your wrists

out?” A second’s pause, and then, “Or would you like to leave? You

know where the door is; you’re free to walk out of it at any time.”

Was that a question? Was he allowed to speak? He raised his hand

like some kid at school, felt like an idiot and put it back down. But

Jonathan seemed to appreciate the gesture, or maybe his confusion.

“Go ahead,” Jonathan said, though he sounded kind of irritated about

it. “You can speak.”

“Um,
punishment
, Jonathan?”

“Yes, punishment. Don’t ask any more questions about that;

you’ll learn soon enough. For now, hands out, or out the door. Your

choice.”

No choice at al . Bran held out his hands.

Cool metal closed around his left wrist, and with it, a moment’s

panic. He tried to pull his hand back, but Jonathan’s fingers lingered,

holding firm, thumb stroking the back of his hand.

“It’s all right, see? No pain. Nothing to be afraid of.”

The cuffs were kind of comfortable, actually, rounded at the

edges like a well-tooled watch band, the fit so perfect he wouldn’t

have been surprised if Jonathan had measured him in his sleep. The

hinge was machined entirely inside the seam, and he couldn’t even

see the locking mechanism: some kind of tongue-and-groove, as

seamless as the hinge, the keyhole tiny. But he could certainly feel

the weight of the thing, even if it was only an inch wide and no more

than an eighth of an inch thick. He was also pretty sure he’d jingle

when he walked, what with those four steel O-rings dangling against

the steel cuff.

Why so many?

Jonathan was still holding Bran’s wrist. He slowly turned it over,

caressed the heel of Bran’s hand with the pad of his thumb—a little

shiver ran straight down Bran’s arm and to his dick, like the two were

fucking attached somehow—then placed the other cuff in his hand.

“Here, put it on. Push the ends together until you hear the click.”

Bran turned the steel cuff over in his hands for a moment, feeling

the heft, the coolness, the sheer solidity of it. And more than that,

too. It was one thing for him to let Jonathan lock it on him, but to