Page 13 of Ward

Aidan

Theventurecapitalistseated on the other side of the conference table is flapping his lips, but I’m hardly catching a word of his unctuous spiel. I can’t stop staring at his ridiculous bolo tie, at the silver bull’s-head emblem resting below his jowls.

“What you gentlemen have accomplished here is a testament to what hard work and determination can accomplish given a little incentive to grow,” he says.

Eight years ago, when my friend, Matthew, and I pitched our start-up idea to this clown, he laughed in our faces. Now the tables have turned. He’s in our boardroom, groveling for a sliver of our billion-dollar pie.

“We’ve certainly outgrown everyone’s expectations,” Matthew says. Thankfully, my business partner possesses the bandwidth I can’t seem to rally for this meeting.

It’s been five days since Grace returned to school. I haven’t been able to stop thinking about the way she looked at me when I caught her listening outside my bedroom door.

The indictment in her eyes, the betrayal...

I should have gagged Fiona before I picked up the crop. I didn’t think Grace would be able to hear us all the way at my end of the house. I’d slipped fully into Dom mode by the time I caught her listening at my door. Not exactly the best time to sit her down and explain that I was indeed beating Fiona’s backside, however she needn’t worry because the woman had given me her full consent to do so.

But without an explanation, what was Grace supposed to think?

“We appreciate your interest,” Matthew says to the venture capitalist. He stands and buttons his suit jacket—my cue to do the same—and extends his hand. “We’ll be in touch.”

I shake the man’s hand and then immediately sit back down as soon he leaves.

“I usually love a good grovel,” Matthew says, “but that was just pathetic.”

I grunt my assent. My friend and business partner squints at me, scrubbing a hand over his short-trimmed beard the color of wet sand.

“You were barely in the room for that one,” he says.

“Sorry.” I pull out my phone to check the time. “I have to be somewhere in a few minutes.”

“Fiona said you seemed distracted last weekend.”

Matthew and I were introduced at a play party over a decade ago by Fiona and her husband, Jacob. Fiona was looking to be topped by two Doms. I made it clear that I never fuck my submissives, and she was fine with that because Matthew was happy to give her what I couldn’t. Matthew and I had never done a scene together, but that night, something clicked.

As our community grew, we made a name for ourselves among the pain sluts and the pro-subs. They still talk about us, though we don’t scene together as often as we once did.

Fiona and Jacob no longer swing, but when Jacob’s out of town for business, he permits Fiona to come to me to scratch that masochistic itch. He knows I have no interest in fucking his wife.

For me, the concepts of sex and kink couldn’t be further divorced. Having another person at my mercy, taking up all of my focus, allows me to clear my mind of everything else. It’s like stepping into an empty room and closing the door. No distractions.

While I often make my subs disrobe, it’s for the sole purpose of expanding surface area. I enjoy watching their skin react to my attentions whether I’m caning, flogging, or adorning them with wax. It’s not inherently sexual, though it can be; it was for me, at first.

However, the last time I combined kink with sex over twenty years ago, it resulted in dire consequences that I’m still paying for—literally. Likely in the form of coffee within the next half hour.

“I’ve had a lot on my mind these past few weeks,” I tell him.

“Right,” Matthew says with a sigh. “Fuck, I’m sorry, man. I didn’t even know you had a brother until a few weeks ago. The fact that you lost him completely slipped my mind.”

“Stepbrother,” I say. “And we weren’t close.”

“Yeah, but still, that’s got to dredge up a lot of shit.”

He has no idea. I could’ve choked to death on the fury I swallowed listening to Grace talk about how her mother used to put her in the closet to protect her from Calvin’s fists.

“Fiona mentioned she met your niece,” Matthew says. “Grace, right?”

Hearing Grace’s name on another man’s lips raises my hackles in ways that are both foreign and familiar. I haven’t dated in years. When I do date, I’m monogamous. That means I don’t sleep with or scene with anyone else while I’m in a relationship. Most of my exes don’t even know I’m a Dom. I’ve shared submissives—which is only fair, since I refuse to fuck them myself—but I won’t share girlfriends.

I remind myself that Grace is neither. She’s the closest thing I have to family, but that doesn’t make her mine. I have no reason to feel possessive toward her.

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