No Strings Attached (8 page)

“Moyra?” He set a hand on my shoulder but didn't press me. “Maybe we should stay down here for the night.”

“I...”
That's what you want, isn't it?
Hell, I didn't know. What I really wanted was to keep my life as simple as possible, which didn't include a new job, a new relationship or both at the same time. “I'm sorry. This will probably sound stupid but—”

“Try me.” He stepped off the stairwell, and as he did, I realized how much taller he was. Granted I still had my flats on, but even without shoes, he was close to a foot taller than me. “Is it too much at once?”

Maybe?
“I...” I wet my lips. What was I supposed to say? “
So, I noticed you were assertive the other night and...I was wondering if you might be a Dom?”

“Depends on who's asking,” Thayre said, and it was then I realized I'd given myself diarrhea of the mouth.

“Oh God, I didn't mean—Thayre, I am so sorry. It's just, I...when we—”

“Moyra,” he said, his voice wavering the slightest bit. “Perhaps this would be easier if we sat down.”

It wasn't up for discussion. Our dance toward what could've been another amazing night of sex had done a complete one-eighty, no thanks to my big mouth.

He gestured toward the sofa, and, after taking a breath, I joined him. He sat on one end, and I took a seat on the other, keeping a cushion between us. Sitting beside him right now may have pushed us back toward the stairs, but we needed to talk about this. About us. My submission.

It was out in the open now—a caged animal I'd let loose without a leash to reel it back in. And the longer the silence lingered, the more I thought this conversation was a very bad idea. Yes, I had planned on asking him eventually, but that was after I gave him my decision on the job as his first violinist.
May as well kiss that career goodbye.

“So, would you like to start? Or should I?” Thayre asked, looking directly at me.

“This is crazy. I mean,” I exhaled, “talk about complicated.”

He smiled. “Complicated pretty much sums up my life. Lets me know I'm still alive.”

“By fighting with yourself every day?”

“Who says I'm fighting?”

I looked at my lap. “ But it's two different lives. How can you balance something like that? I'm sorry. I'm having a hard time wrapping my head around this.”

“Moyra, this doesn't change anything. For me, you, or whatever we have going on between us.”

“But it does.” I met his gaze, but I couldn't return his supportive smile. “God, I've been fighting that part of myself since my ex, and I thought I had it under control until—”

“The other night.” He nodded his understanding. “It's one thing for a vanilla couple to experiment with kink, but something else entirely when it comes to our lifestyle and trying to be something we aren't.”

“You sound like you're talking from experience.”

“Maybe I am, but you obviously are. Listen, I'm not going to pry, but at least now I understand why you were hesitant the other night. We have a good thing here, our friendship. You're probably thinking there's no way we can build a new relationship, professional or otherwise, without screwing up what we already have. Am I right?”

“Pretty much.”

He reached across the middle cushion and squeezed my hands. “And you think you're the only one with those fears?” He drew in a deep breath, and when his gaze met mine again, his expression softened. “If there's one thing fear has taught me, it's that the cause is usually worth it. I was scared to death when I started conducting, but I did it anyway because it gave me that rush. These days, I couldn't be a violinist, even if my life depended on it. I've come too far. Lived this life too long. Same thing goes for being a Dom, or you being a sub. Try and hide it all you like, but even if you keep the truth from everyone else, it will always be there.”

“I'm beginning to see that.”

“Then why sound so disappointed? Are you ashamed of who you are?”

While I might not have been happy with Bret or my job, the disgust I felt had never been with myself, but the circumstances I constantly faced. “No, I don't think I am. But he—”
He wasn't a real Dom.
More like he wasn't the Dom I expected him to be.

He'd always been open to the idea of kink, and when I told him I was a sub, he decided to give the role of a Dom a try. Problem is, you can't learn to be a Dom or a sub. It's a part of oneself—a trait I thought I saw in Bret a very long time ago.

I was dead wrong. The control I freely gave to him out of trust was abused. He took it as my giving him permission to disrespect me as a person. I tried to tell him there was a certain balance between a sub and her Dom. I told him there were different levels of control. I was only looking for it in the bedroom whereas he saw my obedience as an opportunity to make him his personal slave.

And that wasn't what I signed on for.

“If you aren't ashamed of yourself or your submission, why hide from it? Submission is a thing of beauty, especially when you can give up that control over yourself to someone you trust.”

“You do realize how wrong this is—us talking about our sex lives, don't you?”

“Not really, no. We aren't talking about our lives, we're talking about the dynamic we shared the other night. Those are two entirely different things. Now, would it be wrong to badmouth exes and go over all that crap until we figured out what was going on between us? Yes. But this? We're talking about the same things you'd probably discuss if you went to one of the private parties in Philly.”

“Even if I'm not sure I want to live the lifestyle anymore?”

He shrugged. “Like I said, you can hide it all you want, but it's always going to be somewhere in the back of your mind.” He folded one leg under the other. “Tell me something, when did you realize I was a Dom?”

“I didn't—or well, I couldn't know for sure.”

“But you had suspicions.”

“Yes.”

“When?”

“Our having sex aside, isn't this too personal?”

“Perhaps.” He reached for the takeout bag on the table, and while the burger was likely cold by now, he unwrapped it anyway. “I can tell you when I knew you were a submissive.” He took a bite of his sandwich, then offered me the fries that were sitting in the bottom of the bag.

I waved my hand. “I'll pass, but thank you.” It amazed me to see him acting so casually about this, especially considering we'd shared his bed last week. “So, when did you know?”

He set the burger down, wiped his mouth with a napkin, then looked right at me. “As soon as you walked into that bar.”

“Seriously?”

“Yup.”

“And you didn't say anything? Not even after the other night?”

He shrugged. “Figured it wasn't my place to ask. Besides, what we did was pretty tame, but still acceptable if I'd been wrong. A bit of hair pulling never hurt.”

I shivered from the memory and quickly crossed my legs to quiet the throbbing of my clit. “Where do we go from here?”

“That's entirely up to you and what you're comfortable with. If you want, we can remain friends and forget this discussion ever happened—even though I consider it a good thing. Or, you can come and play for me until after Webster hall.”

“And if I want to try something else?”

“Sleep on it for a few nights, and we can talk about it again. I don't want you to feel as though I'm forcing you to do any of this. You have every right to decline every single one of my offers, but I also won't walk away should you ask for my help.”

“So I guess that means sex is out for tonight, huh?”

He cocked an eyebrow at me. “I never said that.”

“But you just said—”

“About your submission and being my violinist, yes. Not sex.”

“I obviously have a lot to learn then, because I thought the other night—”

“Was us clearing the air. Besides, you've had sex without anything attached before.”

“Yeah, but not with someone I actually lo—someone I knew.”

He smirked. “Minor details. The ball's in your court now. We can sit here and talk, you could play some more of my music, or we can go upstairs and see what happens.”

“Well,” I said, scooting over so I was sitting on the middle cushion. “Seeing as we've already talked and we were in the middle of something before then...” I leaned in, barely kissing him on the lips. “I guess we could—”

“Upstairs.
Now.
” 

I
took the stairs two at a time. I didn't wait for Thayre's direction, knowing right where his room was. And he didn't stop me, not even after we got inside his room.

“On the bed,” he said, heading for the nightstand. “But lie with your legs over the edge.”

“Long-ways or—”

“Doesn't matter,” he threw over his shoulder as he searched through his closet for something.

Aside from the bit of light filtering in from the hall, I couldn't see much at all, but apparently Thayre knew exactly where he was going, returning moments later.

“Inch down a bit so your ass is on the edge.”

I trembled from his tone as much as his words but did as he asked.  I lifted my head and glanced down at the foot of the bed, eying the few items he put there: a scarf, cuffs and...
a wand?

“Before you freak out, let me explain,” Thayre said as he picked the scarf up off the mattress. “I got these things out in case you wanted to try something else, but I'm not asking you to do anything. This is entirely up to you, but what you decide now will give me a better understanding of where we're headed. Think of it as a roadmap.”

I sat up and held out a hand, taking the scarf from Thayre when he offered it to me. “And the scarf's for what exactly?”

“Blindfold.” He shrugged. “What? I had to improvise. Besides, most of the blindfolds out there don't do shit. That said, I have a feeling you know what these are.” He held up the set of leather cuffs, unsnapping one side so it was open. “They're more comfortable than they look.”

“And the wand? Is that...”

“A conductor's baton, yes.” He laughed.

“More improvising?”

“Not really. You'd be surprised how well it works as a tickler.” He went on. “Everything I have out now could be used by any couple.”

“Kink,” I said, nodding.

“Yes. Just because one might be bound or use a paddle, it doesn't make what they're doing BDSM. I know I've said this before, but it needs repeating. Being a sub is as much a frame of mind as anything else. Without having those submissive tendencies the same way I have them as a Dom, we'd be another couple experimenting with kink. And we can still work along those lines. This can go as little or as far as you like.”

“For now?” I paused, but the lift of his eyebrows asked me to continue. “I want to forget about the kink, my submission or anything else that might have to do with that lifestyle.”

He nodded, but I didn't miss the flicker of disappointment in his eyes. “I'm okay with that, but if you change your mind—”

“I'll let you know.”

Thayre patted on the mattress. “Lie back and, if it's not too much to ask, close your eyes.”

I settled down, and after a bit of hesitation on my part, I shut my eyes. Thayre didn't move or speak for a long, unnerving moment. And soon, I couldn't remember where I'd left him before I closed my eyes. At the foot of the bed, of course, but how close was he? Where were his hands? His eyes? Was he looking at me or something else?

I shivered and folded my hands behind my head. I was still clothed. My legs hung off the edge of the bed. I wasn't exposed, and yet I was completely vulnerable. In a good way. This was the one guy I knew I could trust, as much from our past as the events that had happened over the last two weeks. And while we might not have gotten into bed together when we were teens, I knew now that the attraction hadn't been one-sided.

Something clicked off to my left, but before I could react, music danced in the air above me. I tried to concentrate on where Thayre had gone, but found myself following the music instead. It wasn't something I'd heard before, but it was definitely his. Strings opened the piece, joined by a bit of trance less than a minute into the song.

My head bobbed on its own while I gently tapped my foot against the air.

“Open your eyes.”

I did, smiling as small orbs of colored light moved from one side of the ceiling to the other. “Thayre, this—”

“Even without bondage, floggers and blindfolds, you can still submit. Your apprehension is more than enough for me. The entire time you were laying there, probably going out of your mind, I was standing right over here.”

I turned my head in his direction, laughing at the small disco ball sitting on his dresser beside the source of his music. “Head games.”

He smiled, then stepped toward me, leaning in to kiss me on the lips. “The best kind. But you see what I mean? You can't control your submission. It's a part of who you are, and, like it or not, you're stuck with it.”

“Why are you so desperate to see me give into it?”

He caressed my cheek with the backs of his fingers. “Because, I can see fighting it frustrates you. But also because you would make a beautiful submissive.” He brushed a thumb under my eye, removing a tear I hadn't noticed was there. “Listen, I might not know what happened in your last relationship, but it obviously wasn't bad enough to throw you out of the lifestyle completely. Even if you hadn't brought this up tonight, I saw the submissive side in you well before you saw the Dom in me. You wear your submission on your sleeve, and while you may think you're tricking yourself, you aren't hiding it from anyone else. And again, I'm not asking anything from you, only that you be yourself around me. Especially when it comes to your music.”  

Tears burned my eyes. I was angry with myself and beyond frustrated with my life. When I wasn't defending myself at work, I was struggling to make heads or tails of my sex-life, and the other night with Thayre only seemed to complicate things more. Something had to give, and it all started in this room.
Right now.

I threw my arms around Thayre, grateful when he hugged me. I buried my face against his neck, but even then, I was pretty sure he knew I was crying. He held me closer. Tighter. And once I'd taken a handful of steady breaths, he drew his head back to look into my eyes.