Page 90 of Masters of Pleasure
“Of course.”She watched him shove the cracker in his mouth.Hopefully, that wasn’t a complete turnoff.
Avery
Holy crap, Nick was in her house, eating her food, looking both tired and sexy after a long day of work, and ready to talk about kink.She felt like pinching herself, except she knew this was real.
“Have you had a chance to look over all of that?”she asked, nodding at the folder as she picked up her own cracker, cheese, and pastrami.While she hadn’t planned on having a late-night snack, it was weird sitting and watching him eat alone.She nibbled hers since she wasn’t all that hungry after dinner at Marquis.
Behind her, her phone chimed from its position on her kitchen counter.Probably Domi or Rae texting her back.She’d let them know as soon as Nick arrived.She ignored it.They wouldn’t expect her to answer until after he left… if he left.
Awareness of his presence in her apartment buzzed through her again.She was used to being here alone, and Nick seemed to take up so much more space beyond his physical body.
“Most of it,” he said, after using some beer as a chaser for his food.“I need your help, though.What’s with the hard limits list?I just pick and choose what I want to do, and they’ll teach me in class?”Skepticism threaded through his voice, and Avery laughed.
“Not exactly.Everyone has limits and things they don’t want to do.A soft limit means it’s something you’re unsure about or aren’t really interested in but might do with the right partner.A hard limit means it’s an absolute no, something you will not do.Honestly, most people think of them as pertaining to the submissives, but Doms have them, too.”It felt a little odd to be talking about this so openly with someone who wasn’t in the ‘know,’ but Avery thought it was a pretty good explanation.“My understanding of the Dominants class is anything you’d be interested in doing with a submissive, you have to experience yourself in the class.”
Nick’s eyebrows rose practically to his hairline.“Does that mean you’ll be doing it to me?”
“Oh, no.”Avery shook her head vehemently.Though the image that popped up into her head of a class where the submissives got to show the Doms exactly how some things felt… Okay, that was kind of funny, but she didn’t think the reality would be.Avery had absolutely no desire to be dominant in the bedroom and have someone else rely on her to make all the decisions.She enjoyed being dominated and wasn’t interested in switching.“I’m sure there’ll be other Dominants going through it with you.Experienced ones.I’ll be your practice dummy.”He snorted laughter at her description, but Avery had a feeling it was pretty apt.She’d find out more once she signed up, but she was only doing that if Nick did.
“Okay, so, help me figure out what my hard limits are.”
Nick
Going through the list of kinks with Avery was fun and something of a relief.It turned out they had quite a few hard limits in common.
Unfortunately, it wasn’t all fun and games.Fire play and knife play, two things that should have appealed to him as a chef, sounded more dangerous than sexy.He ended up putting them down as ‘maybes,’ so they were a soft limit rather than a hard one because he could tell Avery was interested.Thankfully, she wasn’t into the mummification, bodily fluids, or needles.
“So, that’s okay?”he asked, marking them down as hard limits.
“Absolutely.The only rule will be not to kink shame,” she said, nodding her head.Nick looked up from where he was crossing them off the list, raising his eyebrows.She grinned back at him impishly.“No yucking other peoples’ yum.It’s fine to say something’s not for you, but not say it’s disgusting, gross, or anything like that.”
“Makes sense.”Even if that was what he thought about some of it.Just looking at the word ‘mummification’ made him shudder.On the other hand, if it made someone else feel good, he wouldn’t hassle them.He and his brother had gotten a lot of flak for being Star Wars nerds growing up, and he’d never understood why people couldn’t let them enjoy what they enjoyed without being insulting about it.
Same thing here.Different strokes for different folks.He could adhere to that… easily.
At least, he hoped so.
It was harder when dealing with things like ‘Consenting Non-Con’ and ‘blood play’ than with a preference for movies.The ‘Consenting’ part was what he had to focus on.He might not get why someone wanted to do something, but as long as it’s what they wanted, he would do his best to honor that.Or at least, ignore what they were doing and let them have their fun.
There were a few things he was less sure about.
“Whipping?What does that entail?Is that like flogging?”He could hear the uncertainty in his voice, which he hated, but Avery had been so enthusiastic about flogging, he didn’t want to come at her with judgment in his voice on this one.Flogging hadn’t sounded too bad, once she’d explained, but whipping?All he could think of was Indiana Jones and that bullwhip.That had looked fucking painful.
He wasn’t sure he wanted to whip anyone.Spanking was going to be hard enough.
ChapterSix
Avery
“Whipping is exactlywhat it sounds like, using a whip rather than a flogger,” Avery answered, keeping her tone light.It was one of those things that sounded scarier than it actually was, mostly because certain whips could be very painful and do real damage when wielded incorrectly.But that was the whole point of the class.“A lot of the Doms at Stronghold use whips.”
“Is that like a bullwhip?”Nick’s unease about the idea of using a whip was obvious, and Avery pushed down her disappointment.She didn’t want to unduly affect some of his choices, especially not after she’d realized he was closely noting her level of enthusiasm for everything and had left a couple options open he’d been hesitant about on his limits list when she’d been a little too exuberant in her explanation.
“It can be, but that’s only for very advanced users.More are about this long…” She held out her hands.“Still can be dangerous, depending on the whip and the force used, but it can also be really great.”
“Is that something you like?”The dubious note in his voice made her sigh inwardly.
“Thisisn’t about what I like.It’s about what you like.”She could live without being whipped.It clearly made him uncomfortable.“I filled out my sheet before I went to Marquis.”
