Page 68 of Kotori
Throughout the meal, I check my tablet discreetly, keeping one eye on her movements. She's growing more restless by the hour, pacing her room, attempting to read, trying and failing to distract herself from the need I planted in her before leaving.
By the time I've tucked Aya into bed and bid goodnight to my older daughters, it's nearly midnight. I return to my chambers, lock the door, and bring up the feed on the larger screen built into my bedroom wall.
The sight that greets me sends heat coursing through my veins.
She's given up pretending. Lying on her bed in nothing but a thin camisole, one hand between her thighs, the other covering her mouth to muffle the sounds she can't contain. Her back arches as she chases the release I denied her three weeks ago, her body responding to memories of rope and control and helplessness.
I turn up the volume, listening to her desperate attempts to stay quiet. Fascinating. Even in private, she fights against full surrender. Her fingers move faster, her breathing grows ragged, her free hand grips the sheets with white-knuckled intensity.
She's close. So close. But something's wrong. She slows, changes rhythm, tries again with increasing frustration. Close, but not quite there. Again and again she approaches the edge, only to fall short.
"Fuck," she gasps, the word filled with frustration. "Why can't I just—"
Because I've ensured she can't. Because the rope lesson taught her body that release comes only through my permission, my control, my generosity. And I deliberately withheld that permission, leaving her body in a state of perpetual, unsatisfied need that only I can resolve.
"Matsumoto-sama," she whispers, so quietly I almost miss it. The honorific slipping from her lips in this private moment tells me everything I need to know about how thoroughly the lesson has taken hold.
It's time.
I move silently through the compound's corridors, dismissing the night guards with a gesture. No one will disturb us. No one will hear what happens next.
The spare key to her room slides into the lock without a sound. When I open her door, she's still lost in desperate attemptsat self-pleasure, too focused on her frustration to notice my entrance until I'm standing at the foot of her bed.
"Having trouble, kotori?"
Her eyes fly open, a strangled gasp escaping her throat as she scrambles to cover herself. Too late, of course. I've seen everything—her desperation, her need, her inability to satisfy what only I can fulfill.
"Get out," she hisses, but her body betrays her. The flush spreading across her skin, the hardened nipples visible through thin cotton, the trembling in her thighs—all tell a different story than her words.
"Is that really what you want?" I ask, already knowing the answer. "For me to leave you like this, unfulfilled and desperate? Again?"
Her breath catches, pupils dilating at the threat. "You—you can't just walk in here!"
"I can do exactly as I please in my own house." I move closer, watching how she presses herself against the headboard, not fleeing but not quite surrendering. "Including helping my employees with... difficulties they can't resolve themselves."
"I don't need your help," she says, but her voice shakes with the lie.
"No?" I raise an eyebrow, deliberately letting my gaze drop to where her hand had been moments before. "Your body disagrees rather emphatically."
I reach into the pocket of my yukata and withdraw what I've brought with me. Red silk rope—not as much as before, just enough for what I have in mind. Her eyes widen at the sight, a visible shudder running through her.
"No," she whispers, but it's weak, unconvincing.
"Tell me to leave, then." I hold her gaze as I slowly uncoil the first length of rope. "Tell me you don't want this. Tell me you haven't been dreaming about it for three weeks."
She opens her mouth, closes it, swallows hard. No denial comes.
"That's what I thought." I move to the side of the bed with deliberate slowness. "Hands, kotori."
For a moment, I think she might refuse. Might cling to the last shreds of defiance and deny us both what we want. Then, with visible reluctance that does nothing to hide her arousal, she extends her wrists toward me.
"Good girl." The praise makes her flush deeper, her breath catching. "Now, there are rules to tonight's lesson."
"I didn't agree to another lesson," she protests weakly.
"Your body did." I begin winding the rope around her wrists, creating a pattern both decorative and functional. "Three weeks ago, your body learned that pleasure comes through my control. Tonight, it will learn that satisfaction only comes through my permission."
The first binding is complete—wrists secured together in front of her, the red silk stark against her pale skin. Not the elaborate pattern from before, just enough to remind her body of that night, to trigger the same helpless surrender.
