Set just before Chapter 9 of Playing the Game, “Trouble Ahead” gives Jay a chance to confront his fears before Henry introduces new games with Alice.
Spritzing mustard sauce from his dinner plate, Jay raised his voice over the water. “So today she wore the pale blue one with the pinstripes.” A lot like the shirt on Henry now, only Henry threw on fancy clothes just for dinner, and Alice didn’t normally wear them to lunch. “You know, the one that looks like it should be in your closet.”
Alice had blamed a big client meeting for the ultra-professional lunchtime getup. Henry-dressy, but with fantastic tits and rounded hips. Collared shirts, fitted jackets, and sleek pants hung hot as fuck on both his lovers, all powerful and commanding, but Alice’s soft curves refused to be disguised.
He loaded the dishwasher with each piece neatly lined up beside its breakfast counterpart. “Except she leaves the top button open.”
“Lovely.” Henry pushed back from the table and folded his hands across his stomach. “Alice has delightfully soft skin.”
Solid and sturdy, with his spread knees hinting at an invitation, Henry filled the seat in a way Jay never would. Biking put lean muscle on his narrow frame, but Henry’s twenty-pound advantage put him on top. Tonight, please, after the kitchen got squared away.
“Like cream.” Rich, French vanilla ice cream. “Sometimes I want to climb over the table and lick her.” Only every time they met for lunch. “But I don’t. I mean, I wouldn’t.” People in the diner wouldn’t understand. Alice probably wouldn’t understand, not yet. And Henry insisted on letting her set her own pace for each stage. If only she’d picked a sprint instead of a marathon. “She’s just tempting. Super tempting.”
“That she is.” Laying one hand flat on the table, Henry gazed down the hall toward the bedroom.
Three days to Alice time. Henry’s longing probably equaled his own. Maybe more, since Henry didn’t get to spend time with her every Tuesday.
“Oh, but the best part?” He scooted around the island. Henry’s dishes needed clearing. “She had some boring meeting to get to, so I said I hoped her day went fast. And she said…”
Henry would love this. Evidence of Alice-slippage always got under his fancy finishes and touched the steel-bodied dominant beneath. Jay reached for his plate, trying to keep his face turned so Henry wouldn’t see the smirk.
A strong hand closed around his wrist, and Henry tumbled him into his lap. “I’ve trained you too well in the art of suspense. My own tactics turned against me.” Gripping the back of Jay’s head, Henry kissed him with deep, delving pleasure.
His cock stood up and wagged, but so did Henry’s, thumping his thigh. Waking his dominant brought out the best rewards. The dishes could wait.
“Very well—” Retreating, Henry nipped his lips. “You wish me to bite, and I will. What did Alice say?”
“She said the whole week couldn’t go by fast enough for her.” He’d been battling a sudden semi then, too, and trying to stop his mouth from inviting her over any night she wanted. “She blushed as she stood up, but she looked right at me and said, ‘See you Friday.’”
“Truly magnificent.” Chuckling, Henry embraced him in a half hug. “You, my boy, have been an incredible ambassador in helping Alice learn to share her unguarded desires with us.”
Just by being her prickly independent self, Alice made Jay extra-important in their relationship. The women he and Henry had met with as a couple in the last few years had all been experienced submissives with supposedly compatible kinks, and not one had been right for them. Alice was different. They’d started with friendship and chemistry. Henry had begun weaving their desires together long before she’d come to their bed. Where she’d be again Friday. She was right. The week really couldn’t go fast enough.
Henry grasped Jay’s hip and stilled his teasing grind. “I want to go over the expectations for this week’s playtime. I’ve done some shopping to enhance Alice’s next evening with us.”
“More panties?” Alice revealed new colors of Henry’s possession each time they met. Henry’d said she’d worn the black ones last time. “Can I take them off her this week?”
Undressing her stripped away the layers of not-theirs, the other-life Alice who wanted to be like everyone else. He had one, too, an outside Jay-skin, but he got to leave his at the door every day. Alice’s built up. He polished the surface on Tuesdays, and sometimes she’d flash inner-Alice, but only every other Friday did she get to be fully herself. Naked Alice. Their Alice.
“Not panties.” Henry kneaded the achy spot where Jay’s back dipped between his hips.
Working out his knots in bed would help. He ached more from an afternoon of paperwork in a rolling chair than from one spent on two wheels.
“Something else silky?” Alice in a long nightgown, maybe. A see-through one.
The massage slowed to a standstill. “Spanking implements.”
The crack of a paddle launched him to his feet. He scanned the room. Nothing.
Henry sat empty-handed, tracking him with an intent stare.
The sound, the paddle, even the sting came from his head. Games he’d been afraid to say no to, certain they’d be his ticket to earning a real relationship and understanding his crazy desire to cuddle at a lover’s feet.
“Bitch can’t even take a love tap on the balls. No way Cal would want his pansy ass.”
Instead, he’d been mocked and humiliated, his arousal encouraged and laughed at while they held him down and made him say he liked being a slave. That if he didn’t enjoy their games, he was a bad slave who didn’t deserve a master. Alice should never, ever feel so small. A gulping breath hurt his throat. “You’re going to whip Alice?”
“No long whips, Jay.” Shoulders hard-shoved against the chair back, Henry rubbed the underside of his jaw. “But I am going to offer her a variety of tools to allow her to familiarize herself and see if any draw her interest.”
Henry slipped open the first two buttons on his dress shirt. He’d taken his tie off before making dinner. Wouldn’t want expensive silk to dip in the salmon sauce or drag through the orange-zested wild rice. Henry took good care of his ties. And his people.
“I have them on the dresser now so you may examine them beforehand.”
Maybe Alice had told Henry she wanted this. She should be allowed to explore her kinks without the hang-ups of a C-student submissive holding her back. He should’ve shaken them by now anyhow. He’d just—he’d have homework. Henry wouldn’t forget him. But Christ, he’d miss snuggling beside them. Again. “And then you’ll send me away Friday night?”
“No.” Resting his hands on the table, Henry stood. His measured stare softened as he took a breath. “I’d like for you to stay and witness for Alice.”
Stay.
Throat tightening, Jay tried to walk off the churning in his gut between the table and the breakfast bar. Something wrong with dinner, probably. A first for Henry. Not affecting him yet, no queasy sour face, but then he never ate as much as Jay packed away. They’d both be throwing up in a few minutes.
God, what would Alice think of that? Her sexy stud, her strong athlete, racing out of the room to be sick because he couldn’t handle—
Henry gripped his arm above the elbow and steered him down the hallway.
If he had to face the toy lineup, he’d be sick for sure. What if she hated paddles and whips but she wouldn’t say no and he got hard anyway? What if she loved the pain and he panicked and cried? He’d ruin their perfect trio, all of the time and effort Henry had put into bringing the three of them together because he loved them both. Jay would be the reason they failed, that everything fell apart and—
Soft. Sinking. The light, sweet orange of Henry’s cologne.
“Deep breaths, please.” Henry clasped Jay’s cheeks in his hands, somehow so close and warm and steady. “Breathe with me, Jay.”
He obeyed while Henry counted. Five in, five hold, five out.
They lay in Henry’s big bed. Naked, under the sheet, facing each other on their sides. Fuck, he’d zoned out. That shit hadn’t happened in months.
“I’m sorry, Henry.” Great submissive guide he was, flipping out over a normal next step for Alice. “I shouldn’t be so—I’ll pull it together by Friday, I swear.”
Shaking his head, Henry gathered him tight in both arms. “You have nothing to be ashamed of, my dear boy. This is an enormous step, however we approach it.”
The last time he’d insisted he was ready, he’d ended up sweaty and sick without a single swing landed. He’d have to do better in front of Alice. Snug against Henry’s neck, he took a shaky breath. “What if she doesn’t like any of the toys you bought for her?”
Henry kissed his forehead. “Then impact play won’t have a place in our relationship.”
“Don’t you miss it?” Before Alice, he’d had his vanilla dates and Henry’d had his club sessions. People he didn’t fuck but arranged playtimes with to keep up his skills in all the things Jay was too weak for. No, not weak—Henry wouldn’t like him calling himself weak.
Henry rolled to his back and pulled Jay on top, holding him close. “You aren’t lacking, Jay.”
“I didn’t say—”
“No, but you thought it, didn’t you?”
Lying to Henry would be impossible. He crossed his arms on Henry’s broad chest and raised his head. “Just for a second.”
“The skills I’ve studied and the techniques I’ve learned—” Closing his eyes, Henry sighed. “I’ve done so because delivering pleasure pleases me. The pain is a catalyst, not an end unto itself. Exposing a person’s deepest desires and bringing them to fruition in safety is a beautiful, powerful experience.”
Henry would make sure Alice’s introduction wouldn’t be like Jay’s. Not even a little. The rough bite of metal around his wrists and ankles. The loud crack of the leather paddle, long and slim. Despite the name-calling and the shame, he’d come anyway. And then he’d gone back for more, toting his naïve hope each time would be better. A big fat lie, up until he’d met Henry. His hair tumbled past his eyes, paddle-black and too quick, and he flinched away. Fucking memories.
Henry cleared the strays, taking care of him like he always did, and cupped his face. “When your desires, and Alice’s, require different skills of me, I will master those as well. My love belongs to you, not the whip.”
“What if I freak out and she laughs?” Insults crowded his head, and he shoved them back down. Those voices hadn’t been invited to Henry’s bed. “Would you still want her?”
“More than you, my dear boy?” Fingers tapping against Jay’s skull, Henry frowned. “No. Were she mocking and unkind, she wouldn’t be the woman I believe her to be. She wouldn’t be the right woman for us.”
But she was the right woman. Henry’d waited so long to be sure. So she wouldn’t laugh at him. She hadn’t laughed last month when he’d shied away from the rasp of her handcuffs on the sheets. Alice wasn’t someone to fear. His head just kept throwing up roadblocks. Her introduction might be the alternate route he needed. Maybe not what she needed, though. “Won’t I be in the way? Distracting her?”
“Far from it. I think it more likely Alice will display a stubborn streak and push herself, which is why I want you by her side.” Henry clasped Jay’s shoulders and squeezed. “You’ll keep her honest. And if she’s unable to admit when she’s had enough, you will be able to speak for her.”
Her witness. He could be strong for Alice. He could watch to keep her safe. “Henry?”
“Yes, my boy?”
A towel draped the dresser between the windows. “I’m, I’m ready to look at Alice’s new toys.”
“We’ll look together.” Henry kissed him, soft and slow, their legs tangling under the sheets. “Your wish book is waiting on the nightstand. Consider the perfect night. For yourself. For Alice. How will our Friday unfold?”
No sex. Crazy, because he’d been wanting her for weeks, but not for this. Not using his dick as some incentive to get her to like pain. Not being aroused by her pain. If she did like the games, he could use his mouth in the morning to apologize for the lack of sex on her night.
Henry trusted him to help shape Alice’s lesson. Together, they’d make her first experience with paddles and floggers a gentle one. The control would be in safe hands. He breathed out, and the last of his fear faded.
Henry smiled. “Now you’re ready.”