Page 3 of Petting Penelope
“But—”
“No ‘buts,’ Pen; you’re clearly exhausted. We both are, come to think of it, and so a bath will be a good way for you to be able to unwind.”
“Are you ordering me to have a bath?”
Penelope’s blue eyes sparked with a defiance that Rachel hadn’t seen before. Her sub was getting sassy, but before she could encourage it, the other woman backed down, the spark in her eyes extinguishing.
“I mean, thank you, Miss Rachel.”
“Youcansay no,” she said, backtracking so fast her head spun. “Some people hate baths.”
“It’s okay,” said Penelope. “A bath would be nice.”
CHAPTER 3
Penelope
The bathwasnice.
The problem with the bath was that it was the sort of thing a girlfriend would suggest, or maybe a Domme after a particularly taxing scene. But they hadn’t done any scenes yet, and Rachel was most definitelynother girlfriend. So, Penelope was left with the unnerving sensation that perhaps she was in a little over her head.
Rachel had found some bath bombs in the caddy under the sink, so the water was shimmering pink and purple as Penelope lay back.
This was helping. Penelope had a larger bust than most, and all that traveling—over twenty hours wearing a bra—had resulted in pretty horrendous back pain. Nothing more than she would expect, after traveling for all that time, but nonetheless very uncomfortable.
She didn’t really have the option of not wearing a bra; letting her girls hang free would pull on her neck even more than wearing a bra would. But the band had cut in below her breasts and her skin was red sore.
Not the most auspicious start to the holiday.
Spooning water over herself, Penelope submerged in its warmth. The problem was that Rachel really was lovely. She was exactly the kind of woman that Penny had longed to date. Before.
A burst of anger rushed through her, and she splashed in the huge tub, sending all that negative energy spinning out.
It wasn’t fair.
Penelope wasn’t a bad person. Far from it. She worked hard, was kind to anyone who crossed her path, and tried her utmost to be the type of person her grandmother would have been proud of. But it all came back to Cristina.
Cristina had been lovely too. So lovely that Penelope had fallen unquestioningly, moving in together after only a few months. But no one at the club knew her, and soon Cristina didn’t want Penny to go to the club anymore. And didn’t want her going out with her work colleagues. And didn’t really want her leaving the house at all.
And then there’d been the teasing; teasing that felt more like ridicule than any kind of affection. Humiliation kink when done right could be delicious, but what Cristina said? Not delicious. It had been cruel and it had hurt and it had almost ruined Penelope’s relationship with her body and her desires.
She’d broken eventually. A shell of a woman that Cristina tossed in a corner, only to bring her out to poke fun at.
Those weekly calls with Mina, Vicky, Layne, and Amanda had been a godsend, the only bright light in a dark dark time. They’d been the ones who encouraged her to sneak savings into a secret bank account, who’d pushed her to get help.
Leaving had been the hardest thing she’d ever done, but done it she had, her hard-earned freedom all the more precious for it.
She’d ended up crashing on Moira’s couch for a few months whilst she got her shit in order. The head bartender at the London club, Moira had reintroduced Penelope to the scene,and acted as her own personal bouncer, approving anyone who Penny had wanted to scene with.
And that was how she’d ended up spending the last couple of years. Casual play scenes in the club with people she knew and trusted.
And there had been Rachel.
Rachel, with her dark eyes and wicked smile, who all but stunned Penelope into silence from the first moment they spoke, had been introduced by Ms. Elisabeth.
A whirlwind followed. Months of intense scenes that branded themselves upon Penelope’s consciousness until she couldn’t even imagine playing with anyone else. Approval from Moira and everyone else in the club, until the two of them felt almost like a partnership.
So going away with Rachel was a big enough deal to begin with, and now that they were here, Penelope was starting to panic.
