Page 74 of Dominion's Guard
I look down. My hands are shaking. The betrayal is infuriating.
"Fine. I'm terrified. Are we doing this or are we going to stand here and discuss my nervous system?"
"We covered birth control and testing at my kitchen table. Anything changed since then?"
"Still covered. Still clean. Still prefer skin."
"Good. Safewords."
"Traffic light. Green, yellow, red. I know how they work, Andy. I've been doing this longer than I've been doing you."
"Hard limits."
"Same as what I told you. No breath play. No permanent marks. No degradation that goes beyond playful."
"Impact play?"
"Yes. Moderate to heavy."
"Bondage?"
"Wrists." I hold his gaze. "Not ankles."
He nods. He doesn't ask why. He doesn't probe the boundary or give me the sympathetic tilt of the head that would make me want to put my fist through the wall. He notes it and moves on.
"I want you on the cross tonight."
The words land in my sternum. The cross means spread open, arms wide, body exposed, visible to anyone on the floor who cares to look. It means standing still while someone works me instead of kneeling where I can control the angles. It is the vulnerability I've been dodging since my first month at this club.
"This is the main floor, Andy. Everyone will see."
"Normally, you scene on the main floor. What's different?"
He knows what's different. Every scene I've run on that platform was choreographed, a performance where I controlled the timing and the responses and the exact amount of myself I let the audience see. The cross takes my hands away. It leaves me standing with my body offered up and nowhere to hide and nothing between me and the man holding the flogger except trust.
"What if I'm too much?" I ask, and the question is the same test I've given every Dom who has sat across a negotiation from me.
"Is that your actual limit, or are you testing me?"
The question reaches past the bravado. "Testing."
"I know." His voice doesn't change. "Are you ready?"
"If I say no?"
"Then we walk out and I drive you home and we try again when you are."
The exit he's offering is real. I can feel it, genuine and free of judgment, and that's why I stay.
"I'm ready," I say.
He steps onto the platform and offers me his hand. I take it and step up, and the elevation puts us in full view of the lounge seating and the bar and the east side of the main floor. I can feel eyes shifting toward us, the quiet attention of a community that has watched me scene with Arnold for years and is now seeing me step onto the platform with someone new.
"Turn around," Andy says.
I turn. The cross fills my field of vision, dark wood against exposed brick, the leather cuffs hanging open at each point. The amber light turns the surface warm.
"Arms up."
