She flushed a little, showing him her bare feet. “I’m just clumsy.”
“Oh, don’t talk bad about yourself now, love. I’ve heard that can get you in trouble in a place like this. What’s a pretty girl like you doing in a dungeon?”
She bit back a groan. “Oh, I’m just here with some friends.” Charlotte was being cautious, waiting back while one of the dungeon monitors walked by. Damn it. Naturally they showed up when she needed a clear path. She glanced back and Simon moved away from his post.
“Jerry?” Simon called out.
The DM turned and walked back by, rushing to get to Simon, who started pulling him out of the way as he spoke.
One problem down.
“Those blokes are kind of scary.” Robert gestured to where Simon had the DM by the stairs, likely explaining some imaginary story. She’d always wondered about Simon out in the field. He seemed so urbane, but he had incredible instincts.
“They are. It makes me wish I’d come with my boyfriend.” She needed him to think she was free to flirt. He seemed touchy.
“I thought you had to have a partner to get on the boat.”
“That’s only for men. Women can come in singles.” It was sort of true. From what she’d learned, there were some unattached Doms, but they were teaching classes and running the dungeons. It was time to really get his attention away from the kit at his feet. Charlotte was moving in. “You know, in case a couple wants to be adventurous.”
Robert’s eyes widened. “Adventurous? Bloody hell. Are you talking about a threesome?”
Unfortunately, he practically yelled the question. Several heads turned.
“Sorry.” He went back to whispering.
But Charlotte had been forced to back off. Bugger. She quelled her frustration, forcing what she hoped was a seductive smile on her face. “Yes. Sometimes we singletons get lucky and find a couple to play with. I saw your sub. She’s very pretty.”
His mouth curled up in the first real smile she’d seen out of him. “That’s brilliant. Actually, Candy and me like to play like that. It’s probably why we thought we’d like this kind of thing. She read that Grey book one too many times, if you ask me. I don’t think they crushed some bloke’s balls in that book though.”
Charlotte very carefully reached down and had the kit in her hands as she moved back toward where Simon was still talking to the DM. He held the door open for her as she slipped away.
Brilliant. Now to get back to Damon and then up to their cabins. She smiled a little. “I haven’t read it, but it sounds interesting. Well, maybe I’ll see you around.”
He reached out and caught her. “Hey, don’t go. Let’s go up to my room. We can have a good time.”
“Or you can take your hands off my property this bloody minute before I fucking cut them off,” an arctic voice said from behind her.
She closed her eyes. How to handle this? Damon wasn’t exactly being professional, but she couldn’t explain why she’d disobeyed him here in the open.
“Hey, mate. She’s single. She told me herself.” But Robert seemed to have some sense of self-preservation since he’d taken his hands off her.
“Do you not have a bloody brain in your thick head? Can you not see the collar around her throat? In this world, that means she’s taken and I can slit your throat for touching her.”
Penny flinched and kind of prayed she wouldn’t have to turn around because he was going to be angry with her whether or not he was happy with the outcome of her endeavor.
Robert backed up. “She’s not wearing a collar.”
She felt Damon’s hand grip her elbow as he whirled her around. He had to know she was working. She was sure he would be upset, but she hadn’t counted on the utter rage she saw stamped on his face.
“Hey, Damon. Do you need me to get a bench ready?” Ian Taggart stood behind him, his face in a forbidding frown.
“I’ll take the sawhorse. And get my kit. I have to deal with my sub. I fear if I take a hand off her, she’ll disappear again. Where the fuck is the collar I put around your neck?”
For the first time, she was actually a bit afraid of him. And oddly aroused. He’d done his job far too well. He’d trained her to respond to him, and even when he looked like he might truly take a pound out of her flesh, she was already warm and wet. “It’s in my corset.”
The time for prevarication was over. Especially when she realized everyone was looking their way. Everyone in the dungeon. All of the scenes had stopped.
The dungeon monitor, who had been talking to Simon, elbowed his way through the crowd. “Is there a problem?”
“My submissive decided to see if she could find a more pleasant Dom,” Damon said, his jaw tight.
Penny shook her head. “No, I didn’t.”
Robert held his hands up. “She offered a three way with me and me girlfriend. She didn’t say anything about being attached.”
The DM glared at her. “Are you trying to get away from him?”
“No.”
“Do you have a safe word?”
“Of course she does,” Damon bit back.
The DM looked disgusted with all three of them. “Then I suggest you make her say it because you just ruined everyone else’s scene with this one. I should ask you to leave the dungeon and not come back.”
Horror settled in her gut. She couldn’t get them kicked out of the dungeon. They needed to be here. “I’ll do whatever I need to. Please don’t kick us out.”
“Are you so ill-trained that you speak to him and not me?” Even in the low light, she could see how red Damon had turned.
It was time to play her part to the hilt. She fell to her knees, head down, and knees wide apart. Tears were starting to fall because she’d screwed up so horribly. He couldn’t think she was really trying to pick up that man. But then she thought about it and perhaps in the moment, he could. He didn’t trust anyone. Not really. There was always a part of Damon that would be waiting for her to betray him, like everyone else had. He’d learned the lesson young, taking it into his soul like an education on how the world worked.
How could she prove she loved him when he didn’t believe in love at all?
“Don’t think that will save you.” He turned to the DM. “I would rather she didn’t spend the rest of this ridiculously expensive holiday in our cabin. Allow me to make up for the scene. I think this crowd would love to see her cry a bit.”
There was a general consensus that her ass should be something the Americans called grass.
It didn’t sound pleasant, but she’d nearly wrecked their cover and she had to make it right.
The DM stood over her. “Eyes up, sub.” She looked up and there was some small amount of sympathy in his eyes. “Tell me your safe word.”
“Penguin.” She couldn’t stop the tears from falling.
“Use it if you have to.” The DM nodded Damon’s way. “Let me know if you need anything.”
“Get up,” Damon growled.
She turned her face up to him. “Damon…”
He hauled her up and immediately laid five hard smacks on her arse, lighting her up with pain. “You don’t seem to learn.”
“Master.” She could barely talk because he’d meant business with those smacks. Her hands were shaking and she gave serious thought to spitting out her safe word and ending everything here and now. He was barely leashed.
But that would get them kicked out. She had to trust him. She had to trust that he knew what he was doing.
“Hey. Where’s my bag? Oh, fuck me.” Robert started to panic, looking about for the kit Charlotte was likely rifling through at this point.
Damon started to haul her toward a raised platform.
“Please, can we talk?”
“Not a word from you. I suppose this proves you meant what you said to me. You’re going to happily hop away and find some other bloody man to take my place.”