Burn for You

• Chapter One: This Day
  
• Chapter Two: Choices
  
• Chapter Three: Shame
  
• Chapter Four: Management
  
• Chapter Five: A New Friend
  
• Chapter Six: Time
  
• Chapter Seven: Tears
  
• Chapter Eight: Love
  
• Chapter Nine: Master
  
• Chapter Ten: Together
  
• Chapter Eleven: Lucky
  
• Chapter Twelve: Detour
  
• Chapter Thirteen: Yes, Master
  
• Chapter Fourteen: Happy
  
• Epilogue
  
• A Final Note
  
• An Excerpt from Command Performance
  
• About the Author
  

Burn For You

Copyright 2012 by Annabel Joseph

Cover art by

LFD Designs for Authors

This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, shared, or distributed in any manner whatsoever without written permission from the author except in the case of brief quotation embodied in critical articles and reviews.

This work contains acts of sado-masochism, objectification, anal play, BDSM punishment and discipline, and other sexual practices.

This work and its contents are for the sole purpose of fantasy and enjoyment, and not meant to advance or typify any of the activities or lifestyles therein. Please exercise caution in entering into or attempting to imitate any extreme BDSM relationships or activities.

Molly paused in the midst of her violin practice, subduing the urge to hurl the instrument across the room.
Breathe in, breathe out. Master wants this. You serve your Master. Suck it up.

This was all Mephisto’s fault. If he was here right now, she’d happily smash her violin over his head. Master hadn’t been after Molly to improve herself until she’d gone to stay with Master Mephisto for a week. Then, suddenly, after a few meetings with Mephisto, her Master had decided she needed to put her mind to something challenging besides serving him.

The thing was, Molly was perfectly happy just serving him. She hadn’t understood her Master’s sudden desire to “broaden her horizons” as he put it. It sounded suspiciously like something Mephisto might say. Master had finally decided Molly should apply herself to learning an instrument so he could relax and listen to her play in the evenings. Molly had suggested the triangle or tambourine, but Master had rejected those ideas and bought her a violin. A thirty thousand dollar violin.

Talk about pressure.

Sure, Master liked to spoil her, but a thirty thousand dollar violin was a little over the top, especially since she’d never played an instrument in her life. The first six months had been excruciating, both for Molly and Master. She lived to please him, but in this, she fell short. Even twice weekly lessons with a violinist from the City Orchestra couldn’t inject any talent into her clumsy fingers. Her failure was a constant pain, made worse by her Master’s tireless encouragement. He wouldn’t let her give up. When she finally realized he wouldn’t let her bail out, she did slowly start to get better.

Now, two years later, she was adequate at the instrument, but not good by any means. Not good enough for Master.

Thanks, Mephisto.

Of course, when Master took her to Mephisto’s elite BDSM club, the irksome man always made a point of asking how her lessons were going. It worried her that her Master and Mephisto remained such close friends, frequently lunching together. She imagined these lunches as nothing more than pow-wows in which they plotted ways to drive her insane. The violin in her hands was proof enough of that.

“Girl!” Mrs. Jernigan yelled from downstairs. “You can leave off that infernal racket. It’s five o’clock.”

Molly turned to the door and squelched the urge to make a nasty face. The grouchy old housekeeper couldn’t see her anyway, and Master wouldn’t like it. He preferred that she behave with grace and decorum. She’d learned early in their marriage that childish or petty behavior was strictly punished, usually with a cane. She would have to stand and listen to a sharp, emphatic lecture, then describe exactly what she’d done to be punished for. She always felt two inches tall as he glared through her recitation. Then, he’d deliver the brisk command to bend over. When she was sniffling and crying with ten red stripes across her ass, she’d have to stand and thank him, sincerely, for correcting her.

Well, sincerity was never a problem. She was grateful for his guiding hand, even when it hurt her so badly she couldn’t sit down. It was her behavior that troubled her, like her impatience with the violin. She knew when Master got home, she’d have to admit she’d lost her temper in practice, that she’d wanted to smash the priceless instrument he’d gifted her with. How spoiled of her. She deserved to be punished for it.

At least she hadn’t made the face at Mrs. Jernigan. “Girl!” came her voice again, like nails on a chalkboard. All right. Damn. Now she’d made a face. It wasn’t her best day, but Master accepted all her weaknesses, corrected them, and moved on. Perhaps later, if he saw fit to punish her and she took it well, he would reward her with sex. Molly loved when her Master made love to her, even when he was rough or hurt her. Just as often, he was gentle and attentive. He loved to make her come.

Molly carried the violin to its case and carefully laid it within the velvet lining. It was valued at thirty thousand dollars, sure, but it was priceless to her, because it had been a gift from her Master, just like the slim metal eternity collar around her neck. Her collar was designed to pass for a piece of jewelry to the vanilla world, but it was so much more than that. It was the only thing she wore on a day-to-day basis, the only thing she wanted to wear. Her Master wanted her bare to his gaze, so that’s how she was happiest. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d worn clothes in the house. Perhaps at Clayton’s annual holiday party a couple months ago. Her yearly opportunity to be snubbed and side-eyed by his vicious, holier-than-thou family.

Ugh, what was wrong with her today? Another transgression to confess—nasty thoughts about his sisters and their jerky husbands, and his stodgy old mother with her old-bat wrinkled face. Master would agree with her that his family was nasty but he’d still punish her, because it wasn’t genteel to think such thoughts. Wow, she was going to get her ass beaten.

She closed the violin case and proceeded resolutely downstairs, before Mrs. Jernigan could scream “Girl!” again in her abrasive voice. The housekeeper took her arm none too gently as soon as she arrived. For a tiny woman she had a good grip.

“It’s about time. Should I tell your Master you’re dawdling around today?”

Why not?
Molly thought silently as Mrs. Jernigan nudged her onto the scale. On top of everything else Molly had to confess to him...sure, dawdling. She lifted her arms so Mrs. Jernigan could measure her waist and hips with her tape measure. The housekeeper recorded all these numbers—to the quarter inch—in a small ledger kept in a desk by the kitchen door. Molly didn’t think Master ever looked at it, but she knew if she deviated from Master’s desired weight and physical dimensions, Mrs. Jernigan would be the first to let him know. Fortunately, Molly’s weight and figure had remained largely unchanged over the years of their marriage. Perhaps because her Master also controlled how and when she exercised and what she ate.

Mmm,
Duck a l'orange
tonight. Her favorite. She always dined alone earlier in the evening, so she could focus all her attention on him once he arrived home. It was important. Her Master worked hard, sometimes even on the weekends, and what little time they had together she dedicated completely to pleasing him, which in turn pleased Molly. It wasn’t only his authority she loved. He was handsome too, fit for a fifty year old, with a full head of blond hair that barely showed any gray. He was tall, with light blue eyes that could be hard as ice or warm as a balmy summer day.

Molly took slow bites, chewing, thinking a little sadly that she’d probably receive some icy stares tonight. To even think about smashing the violin... She would have to practice harder. She would promise Master after he punished her, when he let her make her pretty little speech about doing better, that she would practice twice as hard going forward to make it up to him. That thought comforted her. Master would understand. Above everything else, he was merciful. He accepted her as she was, which was why she loved him so much it hurt her sometimes. Literally hurt her. She’d lie in bed beside him—if she’d been permitted to sleep in his bed—or on her pallet on the floor if she wasn’t, and ache with love for him.

It was like her life was split into two sections, before Master and after Master. She’d met her Master when she was in her early twenties. She was thirty now, but her years of courtship and marriage to Master were all she thought about, not her previous life. Her previous life was like some dream, or nightmare, fading a little more each year.

The duck was delicious, as always. Molly took a few bites of salad and drank the milk Master insisted on, even though she didn’t like it. It was Friday and Master would be home soon. A whole weekend with him. She hoped he didn’t have to work over the weekend, but if he did, she’d deal with it. She’d use the time to practice!

Mrs. Jernigan poked her head in, her glance clearly broadcasting that she thought Molly was “dawdling” again. But Master liked when Molly ate slowly and sedately. Sometimes he’d take her out to an expensive restaurant and it was like being in heaven for two or three hours. They’d linger over course after course, wine and coffee and dessert, and he would give her that look across the table, that look that expressed such mastery and ownership, but kindness and sexiness too.

Molly placed her napkin beside her plate. Mrs. Jernigan came in to clear the table and take the plates back to the cook, who would then turn around and begin preparing Master’s dinner. Molly heard that Master paid the cook a lot. He probably paid Mrs. Jernigan a lot too, to keep quiet about the lifestyle they shared. “Hurry, girl,” the old woman said. “Go wash and do something with that hair of yours. Then you can read in the living room until your Master’s on the way up.”

Master always buzzed Mrs. Jernigan when he got to the lobby of their building so Molly would know to get in position to greet him at the door. It was her absolute favorite time of day, when Mrs. Jernigan yelled “He’s coming!” and Molly would put away her book and hurry over to the foyer to kneel the way he’d taught her. Legs spread, hands in her lap, head bowed submissively. A slave pose, but to her, it was her Master’s pose. “Why do you wait with your legs spread, girl?” he would quiz her sometimes.

“Because my body belongs to you, Master,” she’d answer. “All of it.”

“And why do you bow your head?”

“Because I’m your slave.”

Oh, God. Molly couldn’t think about those conversations or she’d have to add the crime of touching herself to her already-too-long list of trespasses. She curled her legs under her and read the book Master had set out for her, an obscure title about the history of China. He chose a wide variety of books for her to read, so that sometimes Molly felt like her head was full of strange, disjointed knowledge. No matter. If he wanted her to read it, she read it. She concentrated on the dense, scholarly text in case he chose to test her understanding. Her fingers traced over her smooth metal collar as she turned page after page. She became so engrossed that she startled when Mrs. Jernigan appeared beside her to click on a stronger light.

Molly looked around in confusion. “What time is it?”

“Nearly seven. Your Master’s late, but it’s Friday. Maybe he’s having dinner or drinks with a friend.”

“Maybe,” Molly said. She wished he was here though. She felt unsettled and irritable. Something about this day just didn’t feel right.

*** *** ***

Mephisto received the call at five in the afternoon. He’d always remember the time, and the voice of the hospital official, frank but sympathetic. Clayton Copeland kept a card in his wallet naming Mephisto as his emergency contact. Mephisto knew he might get this call one day, but he’d hoped it would be a lot later. Decades later. Clay was only fifty years old.

Mephisto raced across town, but he was too late. The doctor spoke with him briefly, explaining a lot of medical stuff while Mephisto stared at the still form on the hospital bed. Clayton didn’t look like himself. It was strange, how quickly the life force fled once the body was gone. It should have lingered a while, especially in someone as powerful and vibrant as him. It should have seeped away slowly, so it wasn’t such a shock to see him lying there. So Mephisto could have had the time to say goodbye. It wasn’t right for a great man like Clayton Copeland to die alone.