Page 16 of Zafira

“She wanted a spanking and offered sex, but only if I could make her cry.” The Dom smiled. “I wasn’t looking for sex tonight, but the challenge would’ve been to break through the ice layer she so proudly carries around.”

“Meaning?” Bogdan stared at Zafira. Her body was stiff as she bore back to try to hear their conversation.

“It’s in her eyes. Inside, she’s as cold as an iced-over lake, but there’s more. Deep inside, I detected a desperation for something else... perhaps a need for someone who could reach past all the chains locking the woman inside and allow her to soar to the sky.”

“If she wants to cry, why not find a sadist?” Bogdan rammed his hands into his pockets in an attempt to still the tingling in his palms, the itching to do just that... make her cry. As the Dungeon Master on duty, it fell to him to conduct discipline where a submissive blatantly disrespected a Dom she agreed to scene with. It was part of the protocol and club rules everyone had to adhere to. The same would apply to dominants who overstepped the boundaries.

“Apparently, it’s an old habit of hers. She has been coming here for the past ten months and always chooses dominants who love brats and allow them to manipulate the scene. This is the second time she approached me. The previous time was just after I joined the club. That night, she came very close to crying.”

“So, you thought perhaps this time you would find the trigger like you did then.” Bogdan’s hands turned into fists. “How often does she come here?”

“Twice a month. Always on the second and the twentieth. For some reason, those two dates must be significant in her life.”

Bogdan’s heart beat rapidly as adrenaline pumped through his veins. Perhaps he had been wrong about her. Maybe she had gotten better at hiding her emotions. The second of February was the first night they had made love in the year when she married Viktor. The twentieth was the last night they had spent together—the night he had declared his love and urged her not to marry Viktor, promising her that they could build their own future together—was also the night he was thrown in jail.

Or perhaps he had it all wrong... maybe it was because she hated the memory of what they had shared that made her yearn for physical pain and tears.

Well, la dracu. It’s time to find out. If the mighty Comare wants to be whipped until she cries, I’ll be too happy to oblige.

Chapter Eight

Crack! Crack!

“Holy yebat'!” Zafira’s cry of shocked surprise and pain at the unexpected strikes on her bottom immediately quieted her loud protest at being ignored.

Instinct warned her it wasn’t her chosen Dom whose hand planted the punishment on her ass. The same dark voice from earlier crawled over her skin, causing it to shrivel with a frisson of fear... or was it perhaps expectation?

This was the kind of Dom she avoided because a strong, powerful Dominant like him would see right through the façade and reach inside her soul to rip apart the shackles she had built over time. The need to be freed from being the strong one and the formidable Matriarch that everyone expected her to be all the time drove her to this club every month. She hoped that there might be one Dom who saw past the brat and freed the woman desperate to break free—the one who had disappeared at the same time Bogdan Rusu had walked away from her and left her to marry his best friend. She had managed to survive all the years because he had returned a year later and had been there—her shadow, her comfort... her heart—until he left again.

That was why she came here... to forget about him while she yearned to find the one Dominant who could awaken the woman Zafira Guzun used to be.

Maybe she had just found him.

“If there is one thing I abhor in my club, it’s a sub using a Dom for her own entertainment. Dom Sergei is a gentle giant who only wants to bring the submissive he scenes with pleasure and release. You know that, yet you ridicule him for not rising up to the game you’re playing. That, my dear sub, is blatant disrespect.” The Dom’s voice dipping an octave lower sounded ominous but strangely familiar. Another attempt to look over her shoulder was thwarted by another loud crack of his palm across her ass. “Keep still... unless it’s your intention to anger me even more.”

“My apologies, Master, but I’ve met the owner of the club, and it’s not you,” she managed to grind through her teeth as soon as the pain settled in her mind.

“You met one. I am the other,” he said grimly. “I recently returned from an overseas trip, and since I’m the Master on dungeon duty, it’ll be my pleasure to correct your attitude.”

“I agreed to a scene with Master Sergei, not you, Sir.” Zafira knew what his answer would be since the club rules and protocols had to be acknowledged and agreed to every time a member booked a visit online.

“Master Slayer to you, subbie. It doesn’t matter whether you agreed to a scene with me. As a Master owner and being on dungeon duty, it’s my responsibility to handle punishment. You do recall the club’s rules and protocols in regard to misconduct toward other members and specifically to Doms during scenes, right?”

“Yes, Master Slayer.” Zafira didn’t believe she was a masochist, except on an emotional level, no matter what her attitude portrayed when she scened at the club. Yes, she knew she chose the wrong dominants, then kept pushing them.

Zafira Guzun, the Comare of the Guzun Bratva, needed an outlet. One nobody would expect since it was something she never did, not even when her husband had passed away. She desperately needed to cry... hard, loud sobs to release the pain and desolation she had been struggling with since Bogdan Rusu had deserted her a year ago. That he had unexpectedly returned, taken her home from the hospital, then continued to ignore her existence hurt more than she ever imagined it would.

It also confirmed what she feared the most... her foolish heart still yearned for the love they had shared for such a brief period so many years ago.

“First, this will have to come off.”

“No! It’s one of my boundaries,” she protested as he unzipped the dress and ripped off the panties she wore under the leather and lace dress.

“A boundary I am surprised no Dom has bothered to push. Be it as it may, it’s more important for me to see your skin while I whip you. Even though this will be a punishment, I won’t be happy if I cut or bruise your skin in the process because it’s covered by a piece of black satin.”

Zafira had already realized this was a Master she wouldn’t be able to manipulate. She had heard the whispers about Master Slayer and how the masochists missed his presence at the club.

Slayer? Zafira’s body turned to stone. Bogdan was known as the slayer of the Guzun Bratva. What were the odds that there were two men in Moldova with the same moniker?

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