Master's Flame (6 page)

“Oh.” Her breathless
oh
sounded like a question.

“Is there something else you’d like to ask?”

He expected her to request a Maxim and Leo sandwich, but instead her brows drew together. “What do they get from all this? I mean, if you deny their pleasure?”

Michel shrugged. “They get pleasure from suffering, and from pleasing me.”

“What happens if they refuse to do as you ask?”

“They’re punished.”

“Punished how? If you are already hurting them?”

Her barrage of questions both amused and annoyed him. “They are punished in various ways,” he said, waving a hand toward the wall of implements. “Harsh punishments, because they’re masochists. They get pleasure from being hurt and humiliated. The trick is to be cruel in a way that excites them.”

She eyed their red, thrusting cocks. “So they feel pleasure and pain at the same time?”

“Precisely. How quickly you learn. In addition to not letting them come, perhaps I will force them to make us come while they remain unsatisfied. What do you think?”

She looked impressed. “I think you’re very good at being cruel.”

She was starting to get the idea. He turned to the two men, still hard, burning with lust. Grasping for control. Objectification had always been their favorite kink. “Stand up. Let her look at you.” He reached down and stroked Valentina’s soft red hair. “Choose the one you like most, dear.”

She looked taken aback. “But if they’re gay—”

“Choose.”

“Well…which one is least gay?”

He laughed, and noted that even Leo’s lips twitched in the hint of a smile. “They are both exceedingly gay. Which one’s cock do you find most pleasing?”

She looked at his own lap, at his increasingly stiff rod, then back up to meet his gaze. “Yours.”

“I see the concept of obedience escapes you. I asked you to choose one of my slaves for your sexual pleasure. If you won’t do it, I will.”

Now his authority—and displeasure—was focused on her. She shivered. “If it pleases you, yes. You choose for me.”

What a submissive thing to say. Perhaps, despite her bold personality, a submissive spark curled inside her, waiting to be fanned into flame. He didn’t need any more reasons to want her, not as he tried to keep her at arm’s length. This little display on the rigors of slavery didn’t seem to be putting her off at all.

With a sigh, he beckoned to Maxim. “Lie back,” he said to Valentina. “Let him have your pussy. He may only use his mouth.”

“Not his cock?” She stared at it, disappointed.

What a greedy little wanton she was. “Not his cock,” he said acerbically. “He isn’t deserving.” Michel didn’t admit that he was too jealous to let Maxim fuck her, even though the young man was gay, and his slave. Michel didn’t believe he could stand by and watch someone else fuck Valentina without suffering for it, and he didn’t like to suffer.

“That’s a good girl,” he murmured as Valentina lay back and spread her legs. He trusted Maxim would make things good for her. It wasn’t the first time Michel had made his slaves go down on a woman, although he imagined it would be the last. He watched Maxim for a while to be sure he performed with adequate enthusiasm before he ordered Leonid between his legs. Still he watched the other pair as Leo sucked his cock, drawing it deep into his practiced throat. Michel reached to touch Valentina’s hair, stroking the wavy strands in time to Leo’s bobbing strokes. His cock filled with heat and anticipation, his whole body given to sensation. Valentina’s cries and moans of pleasure heightened his own enjoyment of this sweet interlude, as did the knowledge that both his slaves’ cocks ached for release.

In the end, Valentina’s glorious lust undid him. He wanted to draw out this sensual moment, feel the waves of his climax as she too climaxed, but it was not to be. The way she grasped Maxim’s hair, pulling his face into her, the way her whole body quivered as the slave licked and teased her clit... Michel’s orgasm roared to life and exploded with greater intensity than he’d felt in a while.

As soon as he’d emptied himself in Leo’s mouth, Michel nudged him back and then pushed Maxim away from Valentina’s pussy. She made a small “oh” sound as he grabbed her thighs and opened her wider for his pleasure.

“Ah,
mignonne
,” he sighed as he took her with his mouth. She tasted sweet and piquant, unique. She was provocative beyond his ability to bear, provocative enough to drown out the clanging alarm bells in his brain.

No, no, no.
When had he last behaved with such poor discipline? She quaked beneath him, but he didn’t want her fear. He wanted her surrender, her capitulation. He licked every inch of her and teased her pearly clit until she shuddered. The sounds she made were as delicious as the taste of her, as exciting as the feeling of her fingers twisting in his hair. When he growled, she opened her hands and dropped them to his shoulders. He drove into her with his tongue, consuming her, memorizing her flavor and all the secret spots that made her twitch.

He was generally capricious about his slaves’ pleasure, denying orgasms as often as he allowed them, but in that moment he needed her climax like he needed air and water. When she dug her nails into his neck and cried out in ecstasy, he wished to begin all over again, but he didn’t dare. Instead, he pulled her up into his arms and gazed at her. She melted against him, locking her arms around his neck. How sweet she was. How dangerous to his continuing mental health.

“You must go,” he said.

She stiffened, her pretty mouth turning down in disappointment, or perhaps horror that after such heights of pleasure, he would summarily send her away. “Why? What have I done?”

“Nothing. It is merely time for you to leave. I have no more need of you here.”

“No, I want to stay,” she begged, clinging to him. “Please!”

He ignored her, carrying her to the door. “You can’t stay.” He let her down and nudged her out into the anteroom. “No arguments. Get dressed and go back out into the club. Dance a little before you go home. Everyone loves to watch you dance.”

He closed the door on her wide-eyed shock. He heard her kick the door, once, twice. Silly girl, to think she had any choice in this matter. He turned to his two boys, his valued slaves who had given him so much of themselves through the years. Maxim looked at the floor but Leo met his gaze. To Michel’s horror, the man’s eyes said,
I understand.
How dare he? How dare he presume to understand what Michel could not? He felt endangered, enraged. He felt a need to expend energy that had no other place.

“On the floor,” he barked at the men. “Now.”

He went to the wall for the snake whip. He marked their backs first, reveling in their pleading groans as they writhed on the floor. Then he had them stand, taking measured shots at their exposed, straining cocks. He didn’t injure or draw blood, didn’t leave them with anything more than a few welts. The whip was one of his favorite toys and he knew how to wield it with a delicate touch. Then he took up the flogger and beat them until they pleaded for mercy. Respite. Orgasm.

Before he’d allow that, he fucked both of them in the ass, first Leo and then Maxim, a long, brutal session that emptied him out with a mind-blowing climax. Then, finally, because this was the end of so much more than this one night, he let them come, tormenting them again with the whip until they shot onto one another’s rigid, muscled bellies. By the time they stumbled from the room, they’d been used in all the ways they best liked to be used. He didn’t say goodbye, and they didn’t say goodbye, although the finality of this parting was mutually understood. None of his slaves had ever resisted when they left his private room for the final time. It was for that quality Michel chose them in the first place.

He crossed to sit in his chair and rubbed a hand over his face. Why wasn’t he in Brussels? Why had he released Maxim and Leo on the very night he’d brought Valentina here? Why was he suffering? His life was not in balance for the first time in many years. It was her fault, Valentina’s, and his fault too. He was acting weak, pathetic, and obsessed. She was a hazard to him, a threat from the crown of her blaze-red hair to the tips of her toes. If he allowed her to conquer his restraint and his reason, it was no one’s fault but his own. With a muttered curse he stood and went to the door. He tore it open and nearly tripped over the small figure huddled on the other side.

She was not dressed, and she had not gone back out to dance and have fun as he’d commanded her. She gazed up at him with her large hazel eyes. Her expression was as bleak as his slaves’ when he’d released them.

“Oh, please,” she sighed. “Why won’t you do that to me?”

He sucked in a breath. “You were supposed to leave. You were supposed to dance and go home.” He pulled her up and reached for her clothes. “For God’s sake, at least get dressed.”

She shook her head and set her chin. “I don’t want to get dressed. I want to be yours, like them.”

“No.” He threaded her arms through the straps of her bra and clasped the front closure, avoiding her gaze. That finished, he leaned down and made her step into her garter skirt.

“I don’t care if you hurt me and make me do awful things,” she said as he pulled the skimpy garment up her legs. “I want to be your slave, like them. Can’t you have a girl too? I heard that you like both men and women.”

He grimaced. “I like people. People who excite and inspire me.”

“Then why not me? You said I inspired you.”

To his chagrin,
La Vampa
started to cry. Not the volcano of tears he expected, but silent, sparkling trails running down her cheeks. She buried her face in her hands as he smoothed her stockings up her legs and attached them to the garters. Her body shook with a misery he could not understand.

“Why?” he asked in frustration. “Why must this be?”

“Because I belong with you.” She pushed his hand away, fastening the last garter herself. “Why did you bring me here and show me this if you weren’t going to give it to me? Why are you doing this?”

“Stop this, Valentina. Stop fighting with me and making demands. If you must know...” His voice trailed off. He was about to hurt her. “If you must know, you are not the type of submissive I’m attracted to. Your uncontrolled dramatics are not to my taste.”

She gazed up at him, her eyes dilating in pain. He bit back apologies, excuses. Amorous protestations.
Everything about you suits my tastes, little Vampa. The truth is, you set me on fire, which is why this cannot be.

He turned away from her to dress, and by the time he turned back she was gone, leaving nothing behind but an irritating sense of loss.

Valentina lay awake in her dormitory apartment feeling suffocated and confused by everything. Mr. Lemaitre didn’t want her. Why? Why had he taken her back to his private room only to tease her and show her what she couldn’t have?

She pulled the covers over her head as images of the evening’s events replayed in her mind. Mr. Lemaitre’s fine, strong body revealed to her in all its magnificence, the bodies of his slaves on display for her.
Choose the one you like the most.

Couldn’t he understand that he was the one who called to her with his creativity, his sexuality, his force?

When he went down on her, she’d been caught between pleasure and shock—shock at the way he’d pushed his slave aside to crouch over her, pleasure at the intensity with which he took her. The fine, strong muscles in his shoulders had flexed and strained as he’d pulled her to his mouth. She’d wanted him to fuck her so badly. She liked oral sex but she loved being fucked so much more, and his cock was glorious. Thick, heavy, and perfect in length.

But after he had made her come...he sent her away. Even now the feeling of devastation curled inside her. She’d sat outside the door and listened to him torment his slaves, listened to his sharp voice and all the terrifying noises. He’d hurt them, whipped them, fucked them, cursed at them and made them cry out for mercy. She’d heard everything, and wanted more than anything to be them, struggling with sheer willpower to meet his demands.

More than anything on earth, she wanted Mr. Lemaitre for her Master, but he didn’t want her. She wanted to be his toy, his plaything, the canvas for all the colors of his power. His parting words had crushed her.
If you must know, you are not the type of submissive I’m attracted to.
The same cold authority that thrilled her had turned against her in rejection.

Very well. Valentina couldn’t stay where she wasn’t wanted. After a restless night, she woke and packed everything she’d brought into suitcases and boxes, and stacked it beside her half-finished art projects. She felt bad for Adei and Jason and all the work they’d put in, and bad for the other performers in
Cirque Élémental
, because her absence would wreak havoc with the production schedule, but she couldn’t bear to face Mr. Lemaitre again after his rejection, couldn’t bear to endure his judgment of her work. She would go home to Naples and...

And what? Continue her family’s banquine act? Sign on with some lesser competitor of Cirque du Monde? She stared at her disordered stack of luggage and boxes, imagined it sitting in her room back in Italy. If she left now, she could not come back. She would be breaking her contract and behaving with an utter lack of professionalism. She kicked the nearest box and hurt her foot so badly she burst into tears. She collapsed on her bed and pounded the pillows, helpless to control the violence of her emotions.

In the midst of her breakdown she heard a knock, soft at first, then louder. Had Mr. Lemaitre come for her after all?

“Valentina. It’s Jason. Open up.”

Damn it. She batted a lock of hair from her tear-dampened face. “I don’t want to talk to you.”

“Open the door or I’ll kick it down. Open it right now.”

His sharp words sounded frantic. As miserable as she was, none of it was his fault and she didn’t want him to worry. She wiped away her tears and went to crack the door. “What do you need?”

He studied her through the narrow opening and then pushed inside, so she stumbled back against her suitcases. He caught her arm and looked at the pile. “What do I need?” he asked. “I need you to show up on time for practice, for one. I need you to answer your cell phone when I call.”