“Hmm. You didn’t look very restful. And that’s not what I’m mad about.”

“Oh, I see.”

“No, I don’t think you do. That cock is mine, Rooster, and you’re not to touch it without express permission, unless you’re taking a piss and then only for a moment. No funny business. Because your pleasure is mine. We talked about this already. I thought you understood.”

“I did.”

“Clearly not, or you wouldn’t have been about to spend when I turned up a moment ago.”

“Speaking of which, my balls are aching a bit,” I said, making a face and an adjustment to my trousers.

“Good,” Captain Martin said. “Let’s see how you feel after two weeks of not being permitted release.”

My eyes about bugged out of my head and my chin dropped. “Two weeks? Are ye daft? I’ll expire, surely, or go bleedin’ mad from not being able to finish. That ain’t healthy!”

Captain Martin’s eye burned with fire and cruelty for a moment. Then he smiled. “Perhaps. Perhaps not. I’d like to find out.”

“No, surely not. Not when we’ve just begun…”

His smile got wider. It could have been glee at the thought of keeping me from release or an indication that he might not have meant his threat.

“You are very lucky that we just began getting to know each other, Mr White. Because if this happens again, you will be put by for weeks without any chance at release.”

The thought horrified me, but the idea also aroused me. That control over my most intimate parts and biological urges seemed a powerful cruelty. But I was confused.

“But how would you…” I whispered. “You can’t be with me all the time.”

“Trust me. I have ways of keeping you in line, Rooster,” he murmured, as if he was telling me of secret pleasures he was privy to. Knowing him as I was beginning to, perhaps that was so. “And the first of those is punishing you when you do what I’ve explicitly prohibited. Especially whilst neglecting your other duties.”

A bolt of fear sliced through me. Maybe being the captain’s houseboy and seed-bucketwastoo risky. I fell to my knees in front of the captain, putting my hands together in prayer.

“Not the cat,” I begged. “Please!”

Less than a week ago, I’d seen what Captain Martin had had Donatello do to a man who had stolen and hidden a brace of pistols. Perhaps he’d been planning some kind of mutiny, but the men gave him up at the drop of a hat because their loyalty lay with the captain. Donatello, on the captain’s orders, had flayed the man with the cat-o’-nine-tails—a vicious implement designed to strip skin from a man’s back and cause tremendous pain—until he’d lost consciousness, then tossed him over the side. I could still hear the screams.

Captain Martin sighed. “No, not the cat. That kind of punishment is saved for very serious offences. I don’t like to do anything so cruel, but on occasion such brutality is necessary. However, not in this instance.”

“Oh fuck, thank heavens.”

“Now take off your clothes, Rooster, and lay them neatly on the chair.”

I blinked. “But I thought…”

He raised his eyebrows, and I determined it best to do as I was told, even though I didn’t know what was happening.

“Yes, Captain.”

He stood there and watched me as I stripped. I became more worried and chastened as each layer was removed and wondered what had possessed me to have a wank in the captain’s bed, when he’d strictly forbidden me to touch myself. Eventually, I stood there, buck naked and terrified of whatever might be going to happen. My cock hadn’t quite got the message though.

The captain eyed my prick with interest.

“Come,” Captain Martin said, crooking a finger. I followed him around to the other side of the bed where the main space in the room was. He pulled the straight chair from his desk and placed it in the center of the floor, sat down, and patted his knee.

I stared at him, confused.

“Simon.”

“Yes, Captain?” Desire, curiosity, and trepidation swirled in my gut.