Chapter 8
Alex watched her drive off, turned on almost as much by their short conversation as he’d been by their session. The feeling shifted gears, morphing into anger as he realized the truth.
The rules.
The Rules.
THE FUCKING RULES.
He headed for his desk to find the paper copy of the contract he’d signed. Hooded Pleasures had been very specific about no digital copies being in existence and in fact threatened to cancel his deal and start legal proceedings against him if one ever came online and could be tracked back to him. Considering the lengths they’d gone to when it came to vetting him for their services, he had no doubt they had good lawyers on staff waiting and willing to go the distance.
Alex pulled page after page of scribbled notes and ideas from his bottom drawer. He knew it was here, safe from casual viewing. A few more minutes of digging pulled it into view. It sat under a stack of tax forms he’d been avoiding, looking innocent in a plain brown envelope.
Alex looked toward the front door before opening the envelope. Part of him wanted Kate to come back, return to him.
The other part, the logical part, knew this wasn’t going to happen.
The rules said so.
He sighed, his arousal tempered by the need to understand what was going on between them.
But first things first—the contract.
Alex pulled the pages out of the envelope and spread them on the desk.
It was a struggle to get through the first page, his mind too tangled up to stay calm and rational.
He gritted his teeth, torn between tossing things around and yelling at the top of his lungs in frustration.
He tried again.
The words became a long black slurry, the reverse of tunnel vision.
Alex drew a slow deep breath.
He wasn’t going to be able to do anything like this.
Breaking stuff wouldn’t help, and screaming would only hurt his throat.
If he wanted to find a loophole, he’d have to be able to concentrate, get his mind in the game.
Calm the fuck down, in other words.
He got up from the desk and headed upstairs, willing his blood pressure to go down. The last thing he needed was to have a stroke before he figured out a way around this, a way to let him get what he wanted. A hot shower would clear his head and let him focus.
The throbbing in his groin intensified as he remembered the feel of Kate’s legs, the touch of her hand in his hair.
The scent of her arousal.
He frowned as he dissected her argument.
Don’t get emotionally attached to a client.
He understood that. It was like designing a game—you had to be able to walk away from it at a certain point and let it be. Too much tinkering, and you’d destroy what you loved most about it.
True, a relationship wasn’t the same as a game, but this wasn’t a normal relationship they were in.
He paid her and got his ass paddled.
There shouldn’t be anything more about it than that.
Then why did he suspect she was more into this than she should be, her eagerness and her actions betraying her real feelings?
He wasn’t a teenager smitten with his first date, falling over himself because he managed to get to first base. He knew when a woman was interested in him and not just in his debit card.
Strictly business, my ass.
Alex paused on the stairs.
How can I get her to acknowledge that there’s more here than just the usual HP arrangement?
He answered himself, grunting as he forced his weary legs up the stairs.
You can't make her do anything. That old thing about bringing a horse to water and all.
But you sure as hell can try to bring her around to realizing it on her own.
She’d made it out of his driveway and onto a nearby side street before she had to pull over, sliding her car into an empty spot between two expensive sports cars.
Her right hand jammed the transmission into Park before sliding down her torso, the need overwhelming her common sense.
If she hadn’t left when she had—
Kate threw her head back and gave herself over to the fantasy, the dream she’d been nurturing before the emergency alarm had gone off.
She stroked Alex’s hair and stepped out from his grasp, walking past him to the waiting bed.
Her heartbeat pounded in her ears, making her momentarily dizzy.
They were both ready.
It was time.
Kate sat down and crooked a finger at Alex, who had stayed on his knees, watching her every move like a famished animal straining to be let off the leash.
He stood and took a few steps before dropping back down in front of her. He stayed silent, waiting for her command.
She reached out and stroked Alex’s cheek, savoring his control. Her hand went to his collar, caressing the ring lying at the base of his neck. She tugged on it, and he lifted his head.
Kate leaned down and kissed him, her blood surging as she devoured his mouth. Her grip on the ring tightened, the passion pulling her onward.
Finally, she released him and pulled back, gasping for air.
Alex stayed on his knees, waiting.
A gentle nod gave him the permission he’d been craving.
Alex took her hands and kissed them one at a time before nudging her onto her back.
Kate fell back on the thick comforter as he tugged her panties down and away, returning a second later to lift her legs and rest them on his shoulders. A heated whisper against her bare flesh sent goose bumps over her entire body.
Alex took her hands and intertwined their fingers. He pushed them down on the mattress on each side of her, gently pinning them both in place.
Alex moved in and pressed his face between her legs. She gasped as he went to work, dropping tender kisses along her inner thighs before dragging his tongue over her wet, aching core.
Every few seconds, he’d stop and turn his head to the side, nipping at the delicate skin on her leg, marking her with his teeth.
The pain of his bite was quickly drowned out by the sharp tangs of pleasure as he returned to his goal, flicking his tongue over the exact spot she needed to—
Kate screamed silently as she rocked against the seat in an effort to ride the wave as long as she could. Exhausted, she laid her head back on the padded rest and fought to stay awake.
Kate panted as she stared at her car ceiling, wondering where she’d gone wrong. Or right. Or whatever had possessed her to get off right there in public.
Thank God no one was around, no curious onlookers to call the cops and start a whole storm of trouble.
Usually she could wait until she got home into a more welcoming environment, her bathtub or maybe on her bed, alone with her toys and her romance novels.
Never sitting in her car, hand jammed down her panties.
Never.
“Fuck.” She scrabbled in her duffle bag for the box of tissue, feeling the heat rise in her cheeks.
Something was wrong with her. She’d always gotten turned on by her sessions. It was a perk of the job. If the sub didn’t sense her need, smell the arousal on her skin, it wouldn’t be real. If all the client wanted was someone to beat him senseless, he could go to a bar and pick a fight with the biggest guy there.
Hooded Pleasures delivered the full experience. You connected with the sub as he connected with you to the point that you were almost expected to go home and take care of business, as it were. Part and parcel of the workplace.
But not sitting in her car.
She fumbled to get the vehicle in gear, a last shiver running through her limp legs as she tapped the gas pedal and the vibrations started under her.
Damn.
She stripped down the second she’d come in the front door, leaving a trail of clothing to the bedroom, then into the bathroom.
Kate turned on the water, spending only a few seconds to adjust the temperature before hopping into the tub and pulling the shower curtain around her like a makeshift cocoon.
The cold water stole her breath away, the shock sending goose bumps across her body.
She forced herself to stay there and not reach for the hot water tap. It wasn’t freezing cold but it sure as hell wasn’t the hot steamy shower she usually took after a visit.
It wasn’t a punishment. It was a way of bringing her back down to earth, pulling her away from the dangerous thoughts that had teased her all the way home, tempting her to break the rules.
Just this one time, her evil side whispered. You could be with him just one time. No one would know—
Kate shook her head.
She knew there was never going to be “just one time” with Alex.
Kate stood under the cold water, letting it chill her skin.
He called you Katherine.
It was only a name.
But the way he said it…
She’d been born with the name, heard it a thousand times. A million times. Why should the way he said it be any different?
It shouldn’t be.
But it was.
“Why?” she said aloud, surprising herself. “Why him?”
Kate pinched her thigh, chasing away the urge to dip her fingers down and inside, to repeat her earlier mistake.
She couldn’t stop thinking about him.
Kate stretched her arms over her head and tilted her face up to the stinging spray.
She shivered under the icy barrage for a few more minutes before reaching for the handles to turn off the water. She yanked the shower curtain open.
Kate stood there for a few minutes, water dripping from her fingers, gasping as the cool air brought another round of goose bumps prickling over her skin.
Enough.
She grabbed the towel and dried off while forcing herself to think over her latest art project.
It was another commission, a request for a dark, brooding scene.
Imminent death and destruction.
She hoped it wasn’t a sign from above.
Kate pulled on a tracksuit, mentally writing out her thoughts on the colors she’d need for the project.
Plenty of deep purples, various shades of black. Maybe a stark red here and there to shock the eye.
Very few shades of gray.
The thoughts helped kill the last bits of arousal as she went into the kitchen and brewed up a full pot of coffee.
At the last minute, she added a sandwich to her snack, stacking the sliced meat high with plenty of mustard. It took a half hour to eat and another half hour to work out a rough sketch, putting her thoughts on paper.
Finally, she picked up her sketchpad and looked over her work, reaching for the now-cold cup of coffee.
Not her best, but far from her worst. The landscape needed a bit more work to bring out the shadowy creatures lurking nearby. A pair of eyes peered out from behind a dark twisted tree, the claws digging into the wood as it watched and waited for the right time to attack the unwary traveler going down the road.
The target, a fat, happy merchant, waddled along without any indication he was about to walk into an ambush.
Almost perfect.
Almost.
Needs a bit more something—
Kate chewed on the edge of the pencil, banishing the last memories of Alex from her mind and body.
Alex stood in the hot shower.
The white steamy tentacles stroked his skin, caressed his aching muscles.
His hand caressed one specific one.
He groaned as he stroked himself, remembering the smell, the sensations Kate had given him so recently. His fantasies had gotten more real, more intense with every session.
The impossible seemed to be very, very possible.
Kate. My Mistress Kate.
Alex mouthed the syllables, drawing it out as long as he could.
Yes.
He came with a jolt, hips bucking as he pumped himself free of the memory.
His left hand scrabbled across the tiled surface, trying to steady himself as he sagged, weak from the orgasm.
Kate.
He felt like he’d run a marathon.
This week couldn’t pass fast enough.
Alex forced himself to stand upright and reached for the soap.
Enough.
Work was waiting, and it wasn’t going to get done while he was jerking off in the shower.
An image of her flashed across his inner eye, and he began to grow hard again, his back aching as the water ran over the inflamed skin. He rolled his shoulders back, savoring the sweet burning in his muscles. He’d looked in the mirror and saw her marks, seen how she’d claimed him for her own.
Damn it.
He twisted the cold water tap all the way, dousing both himself and his arousal with a blinding-cold deluge of water.
There.
The biting cold shrank any remnants of desire to atom-sized status as he gasped under the icy barrage.
Finally spent, Alex staggered out of the shower. He grabbed at the towel rack, his hand landing on the bar with his full weight instead of the green towel he’d been aiming for.
The metal bar bent and snapped off the wall. It fell to the floor with a clatter, leaving two gouged holes in the pale blue drywall.
“Fuck.” He looked at the mangled wall.
It’d take him a few hours to spackle the holes and find the right color paint to do over the repairs. Good thing the hardware stores kept Sunday hours. He didn’t keep any of that on hand, and now he needed to go out and get supplies.
The contract was going to have to wait.
He shook his head, mentally thanking fate for supplying a diversion on top of his regular work.
This would keep his mind off Kate for at least a few hours.
But it wouldn’t solve the puzzle he’d created for himself.
It was Wednesday, and Kate loved delivering what a client needed.
Even when he didn’t know it.
The latest example stared at her via the computer monitor, his shocked expression morphing into a wide grin as she held up the finished product, the elf diving into battle.
“I can’t believe you did it. My God—” Sam shook his head, sitting at his desk three time zones away. “You captured him perfectly.” He squinted, studying the image again. “Damn, you even caught the nick on the battle-ax from that damned stone golem.”
Kate laughed. “You told me it was one of your best battles. Couldn’t not put it in.”
“It’s magnificent.” He couldn’t stop grinning, his smile contagious. “Let me see it again?”
Kate smiled as she held up the finished picture to the camera mounted atop her computer. “I’ll matte it, get it into a frame and have it to you next week by courier, as we agreed upon. The scan will be in your email in a few hours for you to use as wallpaper or whatever—I didn’t want to send it until I got your approval.”
“Which you have. Tons and tons and tons of approval.” He let out another whistle as he turned his attention to the keyboard in front of him. “I’ll send your payment immediately.” Sam looked up at the camera with unabashed glee. “I can’t thank you enough. I’ve been searching for something like this for years. I never had the skill to do it properly, and when he reached epic level, I had to do something to commemorate the occasion.” He licked his lips before continuing. “Do you mind if I give your name to some of the other guys and girls in my gaming group? Some of them—”
“No problem at all.” Kate put the picture down. “I’d be glad to discuss more commissions with them. As long as they supply all the details and don’t mind waiting in line.” She waved a finger at him. “Good work takes time. I won’t deliver shoddy work, and I won’t be rushed.”
“I’ll tell them. And I agree.” Sam beamed. “Thanks again. I really, really appreciate this. I’ll let you know when the courier arrives.”
“No problem. Enjoy.” Kate smiled as the email came though confirming his payment. “Everything’s cool. Now go find a spot on your wall for this.”
Sam laughed. “Roger that. Have a good day.” He cut the connection, and the screen went blank.
Kate sat back, savoring the good feelings. There was a sense of satisfaction when you started a project and ran it right to the end, making it the best you could.
Like her work with Hooded Pleasures.
Alex.
She flashed back to their imagined coupling, the intense memory sending a shudder through her.
Alex.
Kate rubbed her face with both hands, trying to figure out what was going on with him. Her other clients were good men, strong men who did their best for her, and she cared for them all, but Alex had worked his way to the front of the line.
He’d swept the rest of them out of the way like a tornado in a trailer park.
Kate stared at the blank screen.
She wasn’t looking for a relationship.
She enjoyed her time with her clients, the emotional rush of being needed, of dominating them.
Walking away at the end with no commitment. No broken promises, no fighting or bad sex.
No sex at all.
When the need overcame her, she had options.
Her hand did the job. Or the vibrators in the bedside table.
At least they wouldn’t walk out on her for another woman.
She couldn’t help glancing at the calendar hanging on the wall.
Four more days until Alex’s turn again.
Her stomach flip-flopped, and she wasn’t sure how she felt about that.
Sunday had become the most important day of the week in Alex’s world.
He glanced at the grandfather clock in the hallway as he waited by the front door, kneeling naked with his hands behind his back. He couldn’t help clenching and unclenching his toes, scraping them across the hardwood floor.
His collar sat on the coffee table, waiting for him.
Any second now…
The door opened.
“And what are you smiling about? That’ll earn you ten strokes right there, smirking like the Cheshire Cat.”
He couldn’t stop grinning even as she grabbed him by the ear and pulled him to his feet. A few steps, and they were in the living room.
“Fifth position.”
Alex knelt on the carpet, hands behind his back. He lifted his head as Kate snatched up the collar and advanced on him.
He inhaled deeply as the lock clicked shut, the leather pressing against his neck.
Yes.
“Today, we’re going to play a game. But first we have to put all the pieces in place.” The low sultry voice sent shudders through him, and he exhaled slowly, trying to keep control.
She moved out of his vision, and he heard her rooting through her duffle bag.
“On your list you included—”
An object appeared in front of him, attached to a long slinky chain.
“Nipple clamps.”
The air rushed out of his lungs in a gasp. He’d read about them, fantasized about them, but now—
Kate knelt in front of him. “Look at me.”
Those blue eyes. Those lovely, lovely—
Alex arched back, closing his eyes and clenching his teeth as the small clamp latched on to his right nipple.
“Look at me, Alex.” The warning tone said that she wouldn’t ask twice.
He pushed himself back up, panting as he locked eyes with her again.
“Red, yellow, green,” Kate murmured. “Tell me.”
Alex waded through the fog clogging his mind to measure his comfort level. The colors allowed him to express himself without having to use his safe-word.
“Green.”
He focused in on what she was wearing, using the desire to push away the pain. Today she wore a luscious dark green corset with a garter belt and black fishnet stockings.
“Good,” Kate murmured. “Hold on.”
Alex gritted his teeth as she fastened the second clamp to his other nipple. The cool chain rubbed against his skin.
“Color?”
“Yellow,” Alex gasped as the sharp twinges of pain died down to a low throbbing, racing down from his nipples to his cock and balls.
Kate gave the chain a gentle tug, and he arched back, gasping.
“Color?”
He wasn’t going to buckle now, not on his first try. He was going to—
A shrill noise shot through the room, a low siren blasting out from Alex’s computer speakers.
He froze in place, the shriek pulling him away from the waves of pleasure and pain.
No.
Not now.
Alex rolled away from Kate, cursing as he fumbled at the clamps. They came away easily when he squeezed the pincers open, but the pain of removing them slammed into him, almost as bad now as when she’d put them on.
Damn it.
Alex swore as it subsided, drowned in the emotional rush swamping his senses.
The clamps fell to the floor as he scrambled to his feet, the blaring rubbing on all his exposed nerves.
“Kill switch. Kill switch.” He rushed by Kate and sat down at the computer.
Son of a bitch—
He jabbed at the keyboard, painfully aware of her confused stare. “I’m sorry. I turned my phone off like I always do, set everything to mute or to go to voice mail or whatever. I remember that from the rules telling me to shut everything off because our time together is valuable and not to be interrupted unless it’s an emergency. Which this is.”
He knew he was babbling, trembling with the sudden overload on his senses.
“I have the computer set up to set off the alarm if my customers call a specific phone number. They’re only supposed to use this number if something has gone into nuclear meltdown.” Alex bashed a key to silence the alarm.
He reached for his cell and turned it on.
Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Kate retrieve the nipple clamps and place them back in her bag.
Alex opened the connection. “What is it?” He couldn’t keep the anger out of his voice.
“Alex? Man, you gotta help us.” The whine grated on his ears. “We got a crisis on our hands. I know you said not to call unless it was an emergency, but—”
“What’s going on?” Kate moved up beside him, but he couldn’t deal with her now, couldn’t deal with what she represented.
His two worlds had smashed into each other with a massive explosion.
“That problem you talked about? We got it, and we got it going on big-time. Raiders, hundreds of them hitting that chest nonstop and then running over to the nearest town and selling their loot. It’s busting the economy and dumping high-powered weapons on the market.”
“Hold on.” A hand landed on Alex’s shoulder, the familiar touch both soothing and inflaming his senses. “Is this Warrior World Six?”
“Maybe.” The cautious response came out of the speaker. “Who is this?”
“A friend of mine.” Alex tapped on the keys to pull the program up. “I told you it was going to be a problem.”
“That’s an understatement.” Kate snorted. “You released the expansion yesterday, and the bug was up on the game forums by last night. I’m surprised it’s taken this long for you to find out it’s being abused.”
“What the—” Alex recognized Jacob’s angry snarl. “We test our products thoroughly before launch.”
“Except this one got through, and now you’re going to pay for it. I warned you that it’d be found and exploited,” Alex intervened. “You thought it was only going to be a few players snatching gold and weapons. You never suspected it’d screw up the game balance so badly. I told you—” He sighed. “I’ll get a patch ready to go as soon as I can. I suggest you shut down the servers until then.”
“We can’t just close the game down. The paying customers—”
“The paying customers are going to be pissed off if they’re getting massacred by free players with way more weapons and gold than they should have. Do it, and I’ll call when I’m ready to upload the patch. Blame it on the power company or something. Just turn the damned game off.” Alex’s voice rose on the last sentence.
“We’ll have to get permission.” The whiny response grated on his ears. “It might take some time. This is a big deal; we can’t just pull the plug.”
“Do what you need to do. And don’t call me and ask when it’s ready. I’ll call you when it’s ready to upload.”
He jabbed at a key, and the speakers went silent.
“You knew about that flaw?” Kate asked.
He swiveled in the chair to face her. “I warned them it’d be exploited as soon as someone found that sequence. The error is in the timing. A player moves to one side of the screen, and he’s out of the reset zone for the chest, barely. He comes straight back, and the chest has reset, allowing him to open it again. Rinse and repeat, he’s got an unlimited supply of weapons and gold to buy more weapons. It’s got to be fixed so there’s a time factor involved, that it won’t let the same player return and—” He frowned. “You play WW6?”
“Damned straight.” She swept a pile of books off a nearby office chair and pulled it up next to his. “One player on the Grave Diggers board noted it but said it was a flaw no one should exploit since it’d turn off the noobs. We agreed, but there’s always idiots out there looking to run wild.” She snorted. “Someone did send an email to the devs, but obviously no one paid attention.”
Alex got up and went to the pile of clothing. He tugged on his pants. “I warned them. It was easy for me to see it, but they didn’t want it repaired because it was original code from one of their in-house employees. Idiots. Fools.” He looked at her. “It’ll take me a few hours to work the patch out. I’m sorry.”
He didn’t have to pretend to be upset. His nipples ached from the clamps, and he was still shaky, his mind trying to process the clash between his two realities.
“It’s okay. This isn’t your fault. And it’s something you need to do right away.” Kate caught his eye. “You were right to word out.”
Alex rubbed his chin, unsure how to respond.
Kate pointed at the monitor. “It’ll take them a bit of time to contact all the important people and get final permission to turn the servers off. Let me sign in, and we’ll see how bad the carnage is. Give you some idea of what’s going on and if there’s more for you to worry about than just the chest.”
“Okay.” Alex sat next to her and reached for his laptop. “I can start working on this. Got all my useful tools on here already.” He shook his head. “I’ve been telling them this was going to be a dammed disaster for weeks.”
“Some people just don’t listen,” Kate said as her fingers flew across the keyboard, logging in to the online game.
He watched her virtual image form on the screen.
Damn. Warrior ogre, level 99.
Alex couldn’t help grinning as the tall gray hulk loped off the entrance platform. It only took her a few minutes to transport over to where the expansion started and a few seconds to see where the trouble was.
The carnage was, to say the least, mind-blowing. Kate’s character wandered in among the heaps of bodies, player avatars that hadn’t been cleared away yet by the program’s automatic system because there were just too many to deal with.
“Shit.” She swore under her breath. “The Bloody Punks are in here. An online guild, they’re notorious for staking out land claims. They must be calling their buddies in here to get as much as they can before you seal up the hole. Blowing away anyone who comes too close to infringe on their booty grab.” Kate rubbed her arms, and Alex saw goose bumps appear on the soft white skin.
He got up from his chair and strode over to his folded clothing to pick up his white T-shirt. A few steps put him at her side.
Alex touched her forearm. “Here.”
She looked at the offered clothing for a second before tugging it on over her corset. “Thanks.” One finely manicured fingernail tapped on the monitor. “I’ve dealt with these assholes before.”
Alex found himself smiling as he sat and began working on the computer code needed to plug the glitch. “Don’t get yourself killed.”
“I don’t plan to.” She gave him a sly wink, and his heart skipped a beat. “But I’m going to call the rest of my friends here to try and keep the damage down to a minimum until you get that patch ready.” Kate opened up a chat window and typed furiously. “We can at least try to hold these guys at bay, keep them from taking too much and unbalancing the game. Most of my buddies are high enough levels that it’ll be hard for these poachers to kill them off.” She chuckled. “The Punks have had this coming for a long time anyway, and my friends love a good fight.”
“Great.” Alex turned his attention back to his laptop as he scrambled to create the necessary code.
A few minutes later he glanced over to see Kate tapping on her cell phone. He assumed it was to Hooded Pleasures, notifying them that the situation had changed.
Definitely no appointment today.
The sadness at that fact was offset by seeing her ogre warrior swing an enormous hammer and take out a half-dozen men swarming around her.
She hadn’t had so much fun in weeks.
A few friends had come to her emergency call, honest fellows who despised jerks who exploited game bugs. They’d fought their way to the game glitch and were pushing the Punks away by killing them off one by one. Her group grew as friends called friends and challenges were issued and accepted. Soon it became a full-out war as old rivals squared off again and the opportunity for both glory and loot increased with every avatar arriving.
The battle had gone viral. In the middle of it sat Kate and her friends, guarding the chest that had, thankfully, almost been forgotten as the conflict raged around them.
Two hours into the brawl, the doorbell rang.
“Don’t move.” Alex got up and grunted. He stretched his bare arms up over his head and coughed. “I ordered us some food.” He tapped his bare torso. “Man does not code on good wishes alone.”
He rubbed his eyes as he headed for the front door and the waiting delivery man. The smell of fresh pizza wafted through the air, and Kate’s stomach growled.
She had eaten a light breakfast of fruit and cereal that morning. By now, she’d have at least nibbled on one of her snack bars or headed out from Alex’s for a hearty post-appointment meal.
He was at her side a few minutes later with a full plate and a can of soda. “Boost up your energy to full.”
She dared a glance at the delicious triangle, her mouth watering at the sight. But she’d have to wait until a break in this next wave—
“Keep on going.” Alex picked up the thin slice and offered it to her. Without taking her eyes off the screen, she opened her mouth and allowed him to feed her, the gooey cheese and pepperoni delighting her stomach.
Alex snickered when she hit the crust. “Leave me my fingers, please.” He jabbed a thumb behind him. “Let me load this up again, and I’ll get my own plate.”
She laughed and hit the key to swing her hammer again. “Thank you.” Kate smiled at him. “How’s the coding going?”
“I should have something soon enough. Jacob messaged me to say they’d take the servers down to add the patch, but not a minute before. Idiots. If you can keep teaching those guys a lesson for a bit longer—”
“Consider it done. Not getting many experience points off these kills, but they’re crawling away. Hopefully they’ll learn their lesson. Or not.”
Alex kept peeking at Kate’s activities over her shoulder and found himself constantly amazed. Her group had managed to carve out a safe zone around the flawed chest, but many of them had died and respawned, creating a time gap while they hoofed it over to where the trouble was. Then they had to make their way through the many smaller battles to return to Kate’s side, where the Bloody Punks still continued to try to take her out.
Kate was a one-woman army. Blood dripped from her wounds, but the ogre wouldn’t lay her hammer down, wouldn’t give an inch. Other players had thrown healing spells and shields over her, sometimes sacrificing themselves to keep Kate upright.
It enraged the handful of players who continued to try to overwhelm her, emboldened by the promise of never-ending loot from the malfunctioning chest.
She was having none of it.
The ogre Amazon stood her ground even as the Domme munched on pizza, slurping on her drink and laughing as the pixilated blood flowed.
Damn. She’s beautiful.
Alex cleared his throat. Now that he’d gotten over the hump in coding the patch, he had time to dwell on the lovely lady sitting beside him wearing his T-shirt with fishnet stockings and those delectable black leather pumps.
“Can I ask you a question?”
“Hmm?” Kate chuckled as a short wizard began to cast a spell, his arms held high and his robes flowing around him. “Sure.”
The enchanter flew back before completing his incantations, courtesy of a spear thrown by the dwarven warrior at Kate’s side.
“How did you discover you were a Domme? I mean,” he added quickly, “I told you how I got interested in this. I’d guess it wasn’t the same for you.”
Kate turned and glared at him for a second.
His stomach sank.
The stern look dissolved into a soft, gentle smile. “I had a boyfriend in high school who loved the same type of magazines you did—but he didn’t want to be the one spanked.” She glanced back at her monitor and tapped a sequence of keys that sent her ogre charging forward. “He wanted to experiment, and I was there. It wasn’t bad at first, but it only took me a few tries to see that I wanted to be in charge. There was an emotional rush, but it wasn’t quite right. I kept correcting him, commenting as he tried to control me.” Kate gave a low chuckle that shot straight to his cock. “I guess that was my first experience with topping from the bottom.”
The massive hammer swung in a killing arc, smashing a pair of wooden shields to splinters.
“We switched back and forth for a few months and then split up over something else.” A pained look came over her face. “Someone else. Just before graduation, of course, so he could take her to the prom and leave me out in the cold.” Her finger slammed down on the space bar. “My parents consoled me with a trip to Europe so I could visit the art museums. While I was there, I visited a few…unique exhibits.”
Alex bit down on his lower lip, hoping she’d continue.
“It’s amazing what you can find if you ask around and aren’t afraid to go off the beaten path. So to speak.” She laughed. “I’d never ever—you can’t imagine what some of those places are like. Pony play, hedge mazes to play in—rooms equipped with everything you can think of and some you can’t.” Kate smiled at the images on the screen. “It took a few days to find the right person, but they let me in as a guest, let me observe. On a few occasions, I got to participate. To them, I wasn’t Katherine, the curious Canadian. They called me Kate and showed me what I could be if I wanted it badly enough.” She let out a deep sigh and Alex could only imagine at the memories he’d brought back.
“It was tempting to stay, but I knew I had to come back home. I wasn’t cut out to do this twenty-four hours a day and definitely not if I couldn’t be in charge.”
She scowled as an enemy gnome got too close and stabbed her with a dagger. Her hit points dipped only a fraction before the attacker disappeared in a bloody cartoonish smear.
“I came back and between the marriages and divorces in my family went to art classes when I felt like going. Nothing like screwed-up parents to keep you on your toes. I tried to stay on the straight and narrow, tried some vanilla relationships. They didn’t work out. I knew what I wanted.”
The hammer flew through the air to punch a tall thin elf in the face. He bounced backward and disappeared in a puff of pixels.
“I started going to a club. Amazing who you can find there.”
He nodded, afraid to speak and break her train of thought.
“Then I stopped going and began working for Wendy.”
A darkness came over her face as she frowned, her mood shifting as she remembered something.
Someone?
Alex saw Kate’s muscles tense under his white shirt for a minute before she bashed on a series of buttons, the ogre punch sending another giant flying to the side.
Kate fell silent.
He knew better than to push.
Alex studied the last few lines of code. It was a patch, and it wasn’t pretty—but it did the job. A few keystrokes sent the file off to the developers, who were probably gnashing their teeth and trying to figure out who to blame for this clusterfuck.
He made a note to charge double for this emergency fix.
Make them pay for missing your appointment.
He looked at Kate and smiled.
Maybe he hadn’t, in so many words.
Kate sighed as the announcement flashed across the screen, warning all the players to log out immediately. She tapped in her thanks to her friends and closed the chat window, began to disconnect from the game.
She was exhausted.
But in a good way.
She hadn’t had such an intense gaming session for weeks. It was good to have a goal, a proper reason to be in there.
It had been wonderful.
She rolled her neck and felt the tension in her muscles.
Ouch.
Warm hands landed on her shoulders. They began to knead and squeeze, working out the aches and pains.
“Crisis over. They’re testing the patch now, and it should go live within the hour if all’s good.” A note of pride crept into Alex’s voice. “And it will, because I know what I’m doing, and I don’t deliver anything but my best.”
Kate hummed as the massage continued, bringing her back down from her gaming high. “Hopefully there hasn’t been any real damage done. Some players might be put off by this sort of thing.”
“They’ll be back. It’s an addictive game. You might take a few days off, but no one ever really quits.” His lips brushed her ear, and she closed her eyes, the exhaustion finally breaking through the rush.
His arms went around her in a tight hug. “Thank you.”
She tried to gather her thoughts. “It was nothing. You did the coding. All I did was help the players.”
“You did more than that.” His touch disappeared.
Kate opened her eyes to see Alex in front of her, a sheepish smile on his face. “You kept me company, kept me focused by playing the game. Let me see why I was doing it, why I pushed myself to make it so right.” He slid to his knees. “Sorry about the appointment.”
She reached out and ran her finger along his leather collar, savoring the rough texture. “You didn’t notice we left this on.” She giggled. “You even answered the door with it. Bet the pizza delivery boy was impressed.”
Alex touched the collar, chuckling. “I thought he was wide-eyed at my manly physique. That should make it interesting next time I order in.” He shrugged. “Guess I’ve gotten used to it.” He locked eyes with her. “Being with you.”
Alex looked at Kate, and she caught her breath. The casual atmosphere, the gaming—it could be one of her fantasies. All that was left was for him to take her in his arms, deliver what she suspected they’d both been wanting for the past few weeks.
She hesitated, afraid to move or say anything that might break the spell.
Ask me.
Please ask me.
Alex leaned in and paused. “May I—may I kiss you, Mistress? To thank you for your help?”
Her head spun, and she made the worst decision of her life.
She nodded.