There wasn’t much I could try, cuffed and unseeing, but I tried to follow the direction of his footsteps and drag myself over to where I thought the gate must be, once he started clanking it.
‘I said wait there,’ he warned. ‘Tut tut, somebody is really asking for trouble, isn’t she?’
The gate was open. I tried to hurl myself at it, but found myself hard up against his body, caught in his grip immediately. He held my arm tightly while he locked us both in. I tried to work out what he did with the key, but I couldn’t.
‘Now then, Phoebe,’ he said. He held both of my arms. The material of his clothes brushed against my nipples, reinforcing the power dynamic. He got to wear things. I didn’t. ‘What is this nonsense?’
‘That’s my question!’ I cried. ‘You can’t keep me prisoner.’
‘It’s not my fault,’ he said. ‘You were in danger. I knew you wouldn’t come with me if I asked you to. I had to take you.’
‘What sort of danger?’
‘Never mind what sort of danger.’
‘But I do mind! Of course I mind.’
He silenced me with a kiss, which I tried at first to resist, to all the more appreciate the sweetness of surrender when it came, as it inevitably did. His kisses were nourishment to me, much more than any food or drink. I would take them where I found them.
Once I was quiet and docile, he held me to him and said, ‘You understand that you’re where you need to be?’
‘I don’t understand anything.’
‘But you’ll behave yourself? Or do I need to show you what happens when you don’t?’
My pussy clenched, clit bursting into full bloom.
I had always liked his consequences for bad behaviour.
‘Why don’t you take off these handcuffs?’ I asked. ‘And the blindfold?’
‘I can’t trust you yet. You’ll try something.’
‘What the hell can I try stuck inside a cage?’
‘I don’t know. You’ll think of something. Perhaps we really do need that lesson in what happens if you do.’
‘I won’t do anything,’ I said quickly.
‘No, because you’ll have this to think about if you’re tempted,’ he said.
Before I could argue, I was bent over his thighs, held down by his hand in the small of my back.
‘Oh, don’t,’ I whimpered, but that was nowhere near our safe word, so he took no notice and the first hard smack of many landed on my upturned bottom.
Through the pain I wanted him to say the words, the words that always drove me wild, the words I craved and dreamt of in my fantasies.
But he said other things instead, things about obedience and submission, about duty and discipline.
My bottom got hotter and I thought about trying to wriggle off him, but first he had to say the words.
‘You mustn’t resist me, Phoebe. You know this is for your own good.’
Oh, he had said them and I could stop struggling and lift my bum higher, asking for more.
He was happy to give it, and eventually I was scorched all over and my skin was tight and stinging. He stopped then, and rested his palm on the curve of my cheeks.
‘I take it you understand?’ he said.
‘Yes,’ I whispered, needing to be touched. I shimmied my hips encouragingly.
‘Good. I’ll be back when you’re in a more accommodating frame of mind.’
‘What? You’re going?’
‘Just for a little while. Perhaps you’ll miss me.’
I was damn sure I would.
I tried to keep him close, but all he needed to do was gently push me off him and down on to the cushions.
‘Can’t you take off these cuffs now?’ I pleaded.
‘Not yet. Later.’ He patted my sore bottom. ‘I’m going to give you some time to think about this first.’
I couldn’t even touch it. More to the point, I couldn’t even touch anything else, specifically my clit.
I heard the gate shut and the key turn and then he left.
I lay on my side in a torment of frustrated desire. I clamped my thighs tight together and tried to generate enough friction to set things in motion, but it was useless. The heat of my behind worked wonderfully well at swelling my clit and making my juices run, but it couldn’t take anything further than that.
I lay on my stomach, trying to grind into the deep-pile fabrics, spreading my legs wide and rubbing myself on them. This seemed to work quite well, especially when I found a position and rhythm I could be comfortable with. I swivelled my hips over the cushions, wondering if I would get into trouble for this. Would he find out? Would he discover a telltale patch of damp on one of the sumptuous silks that would doom me to punishment?
And what if he did?
I wouldn’t be unhappy about it.
I scissored my thighs together, clamping a big fat pillow between them, humping it with determination. I was thus engaged when the door opened again.
I had to stop, though I was so close, so tormentingly close. I hid my face in the fabrics and muffled a moan.
‘Goodness me.’ His footsteps approached. ‘Whatever do we have here?’
I held myself perfectly still, unable to answer.
‘It looks as if somebody needs something quite badly. Is that right?’
I made an incoherent sound, biting on a tassel.
‘Answer me, Phoebe.’
‘Yes.’
‘Get up on your knees and answer properly. I’m not underneath that cushion, am I?’
Unwillingly, I made the effort to raise myself, not so easy without the use of my hands. My shame-stained face directed at him, I whispered, ‘Yes,’ again.
‘And what is it that you need? Tell me.’
‘I need to come.’
‘Why do you need to come, Phoebe?’
‘Because … I’m a bit … aroused.’
‘A bit aroused?’
‘Quite a lot aroused.’
‘I can tell. How did that happen, then? What aroused you?’
His footsteps travelled the perimeter of the cage. I followed them with my ears, moving my neck in sympathy.
‘I think … I don’t know.’
I lost my nerve at the last minute. I knew he wouldn’t stand for that.
‘You don’t know? How can you not know what turns you on?’
‘I do know. I don’t want to say.’
‘Well, you don’t have the choice. You have to tell me. Especially if you ever want those cuffs off. So?’
‘It was because of what you did to me.’
‘Oh.’ I could hear the weight of pleasure and triumph in his voice, even though I knew this wouldn’t be specific enough. ‘What I did to you. I see. And what was that?’
‘You …’ I stopped to heave a heavy sigh. He knew this was always the most difficult