Kaleidoscope: No Proscenium (M/F, FFFF+/M, MM/MF, F/M. F/F, etc.)

[FabianStr2016]

Everything is so great, the story, writing, characters... Im really exited for the next part!

[Fandango]

Chapter 6 - Cognitive Dissonance (Julie Huff's POV) F/M, M/F, F/F [Part 15 of 15]

December 10, 2022

Julie: You sure that everything is alright, babe?

Brendan: Of course, Jules. I’m good. I’m great. I needed to get some stuff off my chest. Today was cathartic. Call me crazy but I’m actually a little excited to go to this party now. Knowing that these girls are keeping secrets puts a little bit of power back in my pocket.

Julie: Alright. That’s the spirit. Let’s go have some fun then.

They loaded back into Brendan’s Corolla and he started the engine.

Obviously, Julie never had sent Brendan her sister’s way. Because it HAD worked out. It had worked out brilliantly. Brendan was the perfect partner. Things had gone extremely well. Brendan had not gone back to Ohio for the whole summer. He’d gone back for a month. But had come back right after the Fourth of July for a short internship program. They’d hung out for most of the summer. Tying each other up. More her tying up Brendan than the other way around. But she’d certainly submitted to his ropes often enough. And eventually something entirely unexpected happened. Something that she didn’t know whether to view as unrealistic or inevitable with the benefit of hindsight. She’d started to LIKE it. She didn’t want to like it. But she did. She enjoyed submitting to Brendan. She wasn’t sure that it was transferable. She still wasn’t sure that she’d enjoy submitting to other people. But she liked submitting to HIM. He had a different brand of bondage than she did. She wasn’t sure that she’d like her own medicine. But she did enjoy his. Not as much as she enjoyed tying him up. But being tied up by Brendan wasn’t that bad. He’d tease her and embarrass her a little bit. He’d try to get her worked up. But she loved the way that he cared about her. He worshipped her. And seeing him in his element was very appealing.

It had started out as a business partnership. She wanted to tie him. He wanted to tie her up. It was an exchange of services. But it took almost no time at all for it to become much more. They started hanging out more outside of their bondage sessions. And he was a really great guy. By the first week of August, he’d asked her out on a date. A proper date. And he’d pulled out ALL the stops. They’d both just turned 21 in June and July respectively. Brendan being older than her by three weeks. He’d taken her to dinner at a fascinating retro cocktail lounge in the Golden Hill neighborhood near downtown. It was called Turf Supper Club. They didn’t cook the food for you. You simply ordered ingredients and then cooked the food yourself on a large grill in the middle of the restaurant. Brendan was a pro. It was the best steak that she’d ever eaten.

He then took her out for dessert in Bankers Hill at an establishment called Extraordinary Desserts. Despite being a local, she was unaware of Turf Supper Club. Extraordinary Desserts she knew. It was a restaurant that simply served desserts. Anything that you could imagine. They served it. She’d gotten the white chocolate cheesecake with berries. Divine. He’d then made reservations for the two of them at a speakeasy in the Gaslamp District called Noble Experiment. It was inside another bar called The Neighborhood and was by reservation only. It was small and intimate and only had four cocktails on the menu. They’d both gotten one called the Dealer’s Choice. The bartender simply asked them questions about themselves and made a cocktail to match their personalities. It had been amazing.

Julie had gone on dozens of dates before in her young life. But this one topped them all easily at every step. Brendan thought of everything. The effort that he was putting in could be seen in all of the little details. He was so thoughtful. He was so accommodating. He was a great conversationalist. And when they finally got back to his apartment after 2:00am…he’d mustered up the energy to let her tie him up. She’d gone easy on him. Though she’d certainly had a little fun with some nipple clamps. But she was too enamored with him to want to indulge in anything too cruel. That night had been perfect. She considered that to be their anniversary. Brendan would regularly tease her by referring to Red Letter Night as their anniversary. She HATED that. By this point, he’d 100% forgiven her. She’d 98% forgiven herself. But she still cringed at they way that she’d handled things. The way a group of people can push a bad decision into a worse one when they think that responsibility is dispersing itself over a group.

She was going to make sure that August 6th was their anniversary. Not April 15th. She had a pretty good plan. It was still over half a year away but she was planning a trip to Houston and Baton Rouge to do two of the top escape rooms in America for their anniversary. Man from Beyond by Strange Bird Immersive in Houston and Cutthroat Cavern by 13th Gate Escape in Baton Rouge. Lexi was going to join them as well as Brendan’s cousin and his fiancée in order to round out the “escape crew”. Brendan would love it. Then he’d HAVE to refer to THAT as their anniversary. He was never mean or malicious when he called April 15th their anniversary. She knew that it was simply a tease. But she hated the idea of it. For better or worse, that was how they met. But she didn’t like how it defined their relationship. And yet as they left Tribute Pizza, she found that the things that she and her sorority sisters did that night were still leaving dirty, smudgy finger prints on her life and her relationship. Those videos of Brendan NEVER should have made it out to other people!! His fraternity brothers shouldn’t know about them!! His shame had been for a select few to enjoy. Taking it farther was entirely unacceptable. And the fact that he still didn’t feel comfortable in her home hurt. But she was going to fix that. She felt betrayed. And a couple people were going to have to learn some lessons the hard way.

She also felt incredibly disheartened that Brendan didn’t see his relationship with her best friend Kylie in the same light that Julie did. But that was his right. That was his perception. Julie was positive that Kylie thought very fondly of Brendan. But she did want them to bond in a way that was amenable to how both of them wanted to maintain that relationship. Kylie was still having trouble opening up to people. It wasn’t something that Brendan should take personally. But Julie understood where he was coming from. And Julie somewhat blamed herself for this. She hadn’t been a constant gardener. There were multiple problems that she hadn’t fully been aware of that she needed to fix. But she would. The wheels in her head were already turning. A plan was already brewing. And the first step was going to be to try and shake out the source of the leaks tonight at this party.

Red Letter Night had been presented to Brendan as him and Julie versus her sorority sisters. He’d put his trust in her and clearly it had NOT been that. She’d been playing for the other team the whole time. But that was changing tonight. There was a new game afoot. And this time she and Brendan were on one side. And at least one of her sisters was clearly on the other side. Finding out which one, or which ones (she didn’t want to discount the prospect of multiple culprits) was going to be the first order of business. She also had a pretty crafty plan to get Kylie and Brendan to bond in a dynamic and meaningful way. But it was going to take a lot of work, a lot of planning, and a level of expertise in certain things that she didn’t possess. She’d need help. She’d need a lot of help. And in order to keep things a surprise she wouldn’t be able to get that help from her best friend or her boyfriend. She’d need to turn to the other rock solid ally in her world. The other person aside from Brendan and Kylie that she knew that she could count on completely. And the one person with the brains and skill set that could help her tackle exactly what she had in mind. Her sister. Lexi. Once she’d sorted out the plan of attack…she’d have to give Lexi a call.



AUTHOR'S NOTE: Chapter 6 was a bit of a marathon, but we are now halfway done with No Proscenium. The story will be 12 chapters in total. I know where the story is going and where the story is ending, but I've only assigned POV roles to Chapters 1-11. The Final Chapter will be from the perspective of a character that will be determined by reader poll. Midway though Chapter 11 I will post a poll with four to five characters who you can choose from to be the POV character for the final chapter. I will honor whatever the poll results are. Some characters will work and some won't but I wanted to see who people might be interested in seeing have their own POV chapter. So I'm interested if anybody has any nominations. It can be any character that has appeared or been mentioned in the first 11 chapters. It can be major characters who haven't had a POV (Mia, Tabitha, Hard Place, Darren), more minor characters (Piper, Monty, Claudia, Rob), or characters who have only been mentioned by name (Dean, Tommy Mack, RT, Lawrence's Ex-Wife). Feel free to let me know if there is a character who has already appeared who you want to see nominated or wait until one shows up in a future chapter and nominate them then.

[Caesar73]

Excellent conclusion of this Arc - which sets the stage nicely for things to come [mention]Fandango[/mention] !

[charliesmith]

It’s nice to see everything come together and I wonder what Julie has planned for the future. I am intrigued to see where the future chapter will take us with regards to the characters introduced. It’s also fun to see a reader poll for chapter 12. I would definitely like to vote for it midway of chapter 11 like you had suggested. Great work!

[Rtj65]

You've rounded off this chapter nicely, as well as setting the stage for what's still to come. As for the upcoming POVs and chapter 12, I think waiting until chapter 11 before making any suggestions makes sense, seeing as there are still five more POVs that we haven't seen yet. I'm assuming one of these will be Lexi - presumably Julie's plan for Kylie and Brendan will be covered in one of the chapters, and we have already seen all three of their perspectives, so I'm guessing that if Lexi is involved it will be from her perspective.

Overall though, I'm really looking forward to seeing where this is going, and I'm enjoying not knowing how it is going to end. This chapter was excellent and brought a lot of the different story threads together and established the interesting, complex relationship between Julie and Brendan. Based on what you've suggested is coming up, I can only see it getting even better from here.

[GreyLord]

You have kept this story at a high pitch of excitement. I am really fascinated about what might happen at the party at the sorority house. I am confident that you will keep up the good work.

[Fandango]

It's always wonderful to read all of the comments and hear from people who are engaged with the story. It really is such a delight. As per usual, I'd love to address them before moving on to Chapter 7.

Well done. The sisters are finally learning about each other. I expect Lexi will finally get the whole story. Excellent writing. You have expressed feeling that I expect a lot of us have. We do not think what we do is wrong. Yet, in our society, there is shame associated with it. I wonder if sites like this might do a little toward helping the public at large understand our kinks.

Thank you. The shame element of bondage is something that I think about a lot. There is a part of me that wishes that it wasn't as stigmatized as it seems to be. But there's another part of me that wonders how the lack of such a stigma would reflect on my relationship with it. Part of me wishes that I could go to the supermarket and see somebody just wearing a ball gag like it's no big deal. But I also wonder if the taboo nature of it is what makes it so charged for me. I think to a certain extent that's what I'm trying to find out when I write stories.

Lexi comes across very well in this part, she was very understanding about the whole thing as expected, but didn't push Julie too much when she wasn't forthcoming about what had happened. I feel like she's going to milk this though, which is fair enough considering that she's doing Julie a huge favour here.

And you definitely conveyed the shame that can be associated with bondage very well - I thought that the description of Julie's dash across campus was really well written, it felt like a very accurate portrayal of what that kind of situation would feel like.

Lexi is certainly going to get her own chapter. It will be the only other chapter that rivals being as long as this one. And in it we'll get a better understanding of the dynamic between the two sisters. They are very different. And their relationship is often awkward because of these differences. But they absolutely care for each other a lot. And while they may prod and tease each other...they'd never willfully let anything bad happen to the other one. Lexi appreciates that Julie is in a pickle and wants to have "a little" fun with it. Partially because she believes that this is a once in a lifetime opportunity. But she's not into the "distress" of bondage in the way that her sister is. Lexi almost exclusively operates on the lighter, "fun" side of the bondage coin. Sort of like when she left her dad to stew in bondage for four minutes back at No Proscenium. Just enough teasing to get your loved one a little worked up...but then Lexi comes to the rescue.

Another great update. Thoroughly enjoyed the interactions between Julie and Lexi. It was also fun to read how Julie discovers that Brendan and Lexi have met already!

I appreciate it. Obviously Lexi and Brendan were going to meet and discover that they'd interacted with bondage prior to his meeting Julie at some point. I decided it might be nice to show the revelation occur within the scope of the story since Lexi and Brendan won't feature together in a chapter again for several months of story time (since this was a flashback and the current narrative is already seven months ahead). So I threw it into this chapter.

Loving it. The characters coming full circle into each other's stories is fantastic.

I'm glad you're enjoying it. There will be lots more characters from previous chapters intersecting and interacting with each other. And we might even come to realize that some of them have already interacted with each other without the reader being aware of it.

Seeing the different parts of this story connect to one another is what really makes this story brilliant, I think. After seeing so much of Julie and Lexi individually, it was great to see their dynamic when they are together. I'm sure the final part of this chapter won't be the last we see of them in these situations.

You have my promise that each of the sisters will get tied up at least once more in the narrative. And each of them will get to tie somebody else up at least once more. So we're certainly not done with Lexi and Julie.

Everything is so great, the story, writing, characters... Im really exited for the next part!

Thank you very much. It means a lot. I hope future parts deliver what you're hoping for.


Thank you very much for all of the comments. Chapter 7 is only two parts, so I think I should be able to squeeze it in before I leave on an international trip. There will be a two week break for this story coming up after Chapter 7 though.

[Fandango]

Chapter 7 - The Kink Shrink (Dominic Waller's POV) F/M [Part 1 of 2]

December 14, 2022


Tabitha: What do you say, naughty boy? Have you thought about things. Are you ready for that big, nasty gag to come out?

Dominic turned his head slightly to look into the eyes of the beautiful Tabitha Caldwell. Her expressive green eyes and flowing red hair punctuated the most gorgeous face he’d ever laid eyes on.

Dominic: Hhhhmmmppppphhhhhhmmmmmm mmmmmppppphhhhrrrrrrmmmmmmmm.

Dominic gave a perfunctory, muffled answer to her question. It’s not like she stood any chance of understanding him. The large white ball gag in his mouth was larger than usual today. He’d been in a bit of mood when he came to her place and they’d both agreed that he kind of wanted to be punished. So the gag was large and the tie was tight and restrictive. He currently lay on his side in a very strict box tied hogtie. He’d been like this for a little over half an hour now and certain muscles were already aching from the way that the ropes constricted and pulled his body. But on the whole, he was still finding it pretty pleasurable. Tabitha wasn’t really into the whole harsh punishments or dominatrix angles of BDSM. She definitely walked on the softer, more loving side of restraint. Hence why he was on his side with his head resting in her lap as she ran her deft, slender fingers through his lengthy dark curls. She’d been stroking his hair and petting his pectoral muscles for the last five minutes or so. Light, gentle touches that soothed him and made him forget that his quads and delts were burning from the strain of the ropes. Helping him forget that the larger than normal gag was starting to hurt his jaw.

Tabitha: Ten more minutes? Is that what you said? OK. Whatever you say, darling. You’re the boss.

God. She was such a tease. He could handle ten more minutes. He deserved this after all. He found himself constantly feeling over the last year that he NEEDED to be punished. He was not a good person. And he wasn’t pleased with himself or the decisions that he’d made. His life was not where he wanted it to be. But things were spiraling and he needed somebody to talk to. So he’d been regularly coming to Tabitha. The Kink Shrink. She was a great listener and a purveyor of first class advice. He enjoyed the bondage. But he really enjoyed the talking even more. He was excited for the gag to come out so she could help him sort through some things. He’d been having a lot of intrusive thoughts lately.

Dominic recalled how he’d first met Tabitha. It had happened as he was digging into a delinquent debtor for his employer, Tommy Mack. There had been a professor of chemistry who was deep in debt to Tommy. He’d blown well over $100,000 betting on sports the previous fall and had stopped payments after paying off less than half of it. Tommy hadn’t seen him in some time and needed to task somebody with tracking him down and making him pay up. That would have been fine. Dominic was good at that. Dominic could have easily handled the job. But Tommy didn’t assign this task to Dominic. He had assigned it to Tommy’s own idiotic brother-in-law Malcolm. Tommy had then assigned Dominic the task of babysitting Malcolm. This had been a recipe for disaster. Tommy had definitely blamed Dominic for part of the fallout. But Tommy had admitted that the way he had handled it was a mistake. Giving Malcolm the assignment made Malcolm think that he was in charge. And Malcolm should never be allowed to be in charge.

There was a reason that Tommy had assigned Dominic to oversee Malcolm. Malcolm was a fuck up. A ruthless fuck up. An indiscreet fuck up. Life was never going to be kind to Malcolm because he was dumb, uncharismatic, ugly, and undisciplined. But he tried to compensate for these things by being aggressive and headstrong. Malcolm never would have been able to trap the professor in an ambush. Malcolm wouldn’t be able to track a guy down if he drove past a billboard with the guy’s phone number and home address on it every day. So Dominic had dug in and looked into the professor. He’d found out that the professor was seeing a girl who offered a bizarre mix of therapy and fetish services. So Dominic had given her a visit. He wanted to see things for himself. That girl had been Tabitha. And Tabitha was magnificent. She was gorgeous and funny and sweet. He’d started hiring her for his own needs and had been VERY satisfied with the results. She helped to center his mind and relieve his stress in a way that nothing else did.

So he was naturally worried when he had to let her know that he was going to confront one of her other customers. Either directly before or after one of her sessions. She understood. And she offered a solution as she was known to do. She was familiar with the customer in question and understood that given his predicament, it was no longer responsible for Lawrence Kinkaide to be allowed to purchase her services. But she liked the man well enough and wanted to make sure that he was safe. They could confront him DURING her session with Lawrence so that the fallout would effectively burn Lawrence as a client. And he could never come back. But Tabitha had made a couple of demands. Lawrence was not to be hurt. She didn’t want to see anybody get hurt. And that was a promise that Dominic knew that he could keep. Sure, Malcolm had threatened to castrate the professor right there in Tabitha’s apartment. But Dominic was never going to let that happen. He was sure that Malcolm had probably wanted to do it. But Dominic was confident that he could easily subdue Malcolm if push came to shove. Malcolm was imposing. But Dominic was his physical superior in almost every way. And Malcolm knew that he had to listen to Dominic. Malcolm may have been Tommy’s brother-in-law on account of being the older brother of Tommy’s wife. But Dominic had Tommy’s ear. Dominic was the superior in this partnership and they both knew it.

Dominic hatched the plan. Tabitha had allowed him to tie her up and gag her when he was going to spring the trap. It would remove her from blame as a co-conspirator and would help Lawrence to see that his actions present consequences for other people also. That had been something that Dominic had really enjoyed. She was a dream. Binding Tabitha was something that she rarely ever allowed her clients to do. But she’d trusted him enough to let it happen. He had savored the pleasure of it all. It was everything AFTER leaving her apartment that had been a disaster. The professor had told them that he could bypass the security systems at the labs at the university. And that they could take a sizable batch of diamonds that had been loaned to the university for research purposes. Dominic had thought it sounded dicey, but hadn’t had the time to work out exactly why it was a bad idea before Malcolm forced the plan into motion. Dominic had wanted to wait until nightfall so that they could do it with no potential witnesses or casualties in the way. But Malcolm had promised Tommy results by dinnertime. So he’d forced their hands. Dominic didn’t step up and he ABSOLUTELY should have. It would become the biggest regret of his criminal career to date. The way things had shaken out was calamitous.

Dominic ended up being the getaway driver. It was an important job and the one that left him with the least amount of risk. But if he’d had it to do over again, he’d have switched places with Malcolm. He agreed that one of them had to stay with the professor and that the professor needed to be one of the men going in to actually steal the diamonds. But he and the professor could have handled things much more coolly than Malcolm did. That fucking maniac Malcolm went in there with a bloodlust because Dominic hadn’t let him stab anybody all day, and made a mess that he and Tommy were still trying to clean up. Tommy and Dominic were always in agreement that they weren’t about causing harm to people who didn’t have it coming. Tommy understood that drug dealing has adverse effects on communities. Tommy understood that gambling and predatory loans took advantage of desperate people. Tommy understood that a lot of his practices were highly unethical. But the man did have some principles. Killing innocent people directly was a no go. And not just because of the fire storm that it would create with law enforcement. Dominic knew this. And Malcolm knew this. But Malcolm liked to push the envelope. He confused violence with power. But that’s what somebody with the limited cognitive abilities of Malcolm would think.

Malcolm didn’t kill anybody. But he’d certainly roughed up a kid. And traumatized another poor student. Two innocent research students who had done nothing wrong. They hadn’t bet on the Chicago Bears money line like a fucking goon. They were just trying to further their academic careers. And Malcolm had come along like a bull in a china shop and given the male student a concussion, several stitches to close a facial laceration, a hairline fracture on his orbital bone, a chipped tooth, and three cracked ribs. All because the kid was trying to protect his colleague from getting smacked around while she was having a panic attack. Malcolm had said that the student attacked him. But Tommy had connections in the police department and Dominic had read the report. These students were never a threat. Dominic had kept tabs on the situation. The student who had been injured appeared to be doing fine. The wounds had healed and everybody on campus hailed him as a brave hero who had been responsible for saving their professor’s life by alerting the authorities. The police had found Kinkaide bound and gagged in the trunk of his car in a car park a few hours later. He didn’t really save the professor’s life. The authorities were going to get tipped off that night anyway. However, the person who appeared to have gotten the worst of it was actually the female student. Dominic had heard that she’d almost dropped out of university. She had eventually re-enrolled but he’d found out that she had regular appointments with a psychologist because she was plagued with panic attacks and post traumatic stress reactions. He’d stopped keeping tabs on the situation a couple months ago because the reality of it had made him sick.

The rub was that the payday wasn’t nearly what they’d hoped it would be. The diamonds had been traceable. It’s common practice for GIA diamonds to have a unique serial number laser inscribed on the girdle. It doesn’t effect the look of the diamond at all. But these diamonds were highly traceable and were sure to be flagged. Since they’d forever be branded as “stolen”, none of Tommy’s usual fences were willing to pay top dollar for them. They wanted around 50% off to shoulder the inherent risk of unloading volatile assets. Kinkaide had owed $65,000. Malcolm had made him steal $90,000 worth with the intent of pocketing the remainder for his troubles. In the end Tommy was only able to offload the diamonds for $50,000. He’d had no choice but to clear Kinkaide’s debt fully anyway to get him to play ball and save face. Malcolm had gotten nothing. The professor had split for Vermont or New Hampshire or somewhere to try and restart his life and get away from the situation.

Things got even worse for Malcolm. Despite the fact that the professor had given the authorities a description of two cartel looking fellows as his assailants, the male student that Dominic had assaulted had noticed a lot of vivid details about his attacker. The female student had gone near catatonic during the assault. She was almost no help to the authorities. But the male student had given precise and accurate descriptions of things like Malcolm’s shoes, gun, watch, his accent, his build, and most importantly a tattoo near his wrist that had slipped into view during the assault. The authorities were closing in on Malcolm. Tommy had had no choice but to send him packing out of town to lay low. Malcolm had ended up in El Paso. It served the fuck up right. His idiotic aggressive malfeasance had gotten him shipped out of the most desirable metropolis in the country into one of the most deplorable dumps that America has to offer.

Tommy and Dominic had had to pull some moves though to stay ahead of the investigation. Crimes against affluent young college students on a respected university campus were taken very seriously. They’d managed to avoid detection and arrest. But the robbery had made national news and they’d had to be VERY careful regarding operations ever since. It was a disaster. And the increased stress of the job was making Dominic miserable. He feared every day that he’d be apprehended and properly punished for his misdeeds. The guilt that he felt was punishment to a certain degree. But he knew that that wasn’t enough. He knew that he needed to be punished. But he wasn’t going to turn himself in. He had never meant for harm to come to anybody. But he was ultimately VERY responsible. Tabitha had refused to speak to him after the heist. She’d seen the news report. Injured male student. Traumatized female student. He was hoping that she wouldn’t go to the authorities, but he wouldn’t have blamed her if she did. He’d lied to her. Not intentionally. But people had gotten hurt. And he was disgusted with himself.

Dominic was pulled out of his reverie by Tabitha's soothing voice and her nimble fingers gliding gently across her face as she stroked him lovingly.

Tabitha: Alright, darling. We’re going to take that gag out. If for no other reason so than you stop drooling on my thigh.

Dominic looked down and saw that he had certainly glazed the lower portion of Tabitha’s thigh and quad with his saliva. This gag was no joke. It was starting to make his jaw sore. He felt her begin to unbuckle it from behind his head and then gently extricate the large ball from his mouth. Dominic sputtered an acknowledgement as the ball popped out.

Dominic: Thanks.

Tabitha: No problem. What did you think of it?

Dominic: It certainly is…large.

Tabitha (chuckling): Ha ha. That it is. It doesn’t fit me. But some clients want to see how big they can go. I figured I’d give you a go with it. I probably shouldn’t have left it in that long. But you just look so good all trussed up in ropes with your mouth fully stopped up. I couldn’t help myself.

Dominic wanted to see how Tabitha interacted with her other clients. Because it might shed some light on how she managed to make him feel so special. He didn’t like deluding himself. He knew that he was a client. She was engaging in these activities because he was paying her. It wasn’t her services as a fetish based seductress though. He’d always heard that you should never fall for a stripper. That strippers had no interest in their clients. Only their money. That was a partial truth. And something that some guys absolutely NEEDED to hear. But it’s not the whole story. Any person, whether they work in arousal or not, has wants and needs and desires. If you fulfill those…anything is possible. Dominic had taken home strippers on multiple occasions. He was very attractive. He was very charming. And he had a disarming aura about him. Maybe that’s why Tabitha had eventually agreed to start talking to him again after some persistence on his part. But he doubted that she was taken with his charm. He was sure that she was only acting like she cared. But boy was she a great actress. She genuinely appeared to care about him and be his friend. He was paying for her time as much as he was paying for her services. So sometimes he wouldn’t even pay for ropes and doc talk. He’d pay for the right to take her to dinner. Or go on a walk around La Jolla.

He wanted to get to know her. See what made her tick. And to his knowledge, she never lied to him. She shared herself. She shared her truth. Sometimes she’d decline to answer a question. But she never fed him bullshit. Tabitha Caldwell was her birth name. But not her legal name. She didn’t want this aspect of her life to potentially derail her potential film and television career. He’d met her sister. He’d gone to two of her softball games on the weekend. And she’d let him come to drinks with her co-workers. When she wasn’t a Kink Shrink and she wasn’t up in Los Angeles auditioning for screen roles, she was part of a non-conventional immersive theater event group called No Proscenium. They ran two shows per night. She’d oftentimes only do the early show playing a character named Hazel LaFontaine. Though she was also the understudy for a role in the later show named Estella Whitmore. So when the other actress took a day off or got sick she’d sometimes have to do two shows. It seemed like a pretty good gig though. She got paid $300 per show. She got to hone her acting craft and work on her improvisational skills. And apparently she got to tie people up. Dominic wasn’t sure how that worked. But some customers allowed themselves to be tied up.

No Proscenium seemed like a great job for Tabitha. Because she was a great actress and because she clearly LOVED to tie people up. And she was good at it. Very good. Practiced. Rigging was something that she took seriously and something that was clearly a passion for her. Dominic thought that she did a great job of pretending that she cared about him and his problems. There wasn’t any pretending about the fact that she loved to tie him up. She couldn’t fake all of the autonomic bodily responses that let him know that she was certainly enjoying having physical control over him. That wasn't acting. That was the real deal. So a job where she got to act AND tie people up. That was right up her alley.

Tabitha: So how are the ropes? Too tight?

Dominic smiled a little bit. They were much more restrictive than the ones that he normally enjoyed.

Dominic: You know they are.

Tabitha: Hey. You’re the one who asked for this. You said that you wanted to be punished.

Dominic: I know. I know.

She returned to stroking his hair lovingly with her fingers. She went quiet for a moment. This was unusual for her. Normally she was very talkative and good at getting to the root of things. So as her silence extended for ten and then fifteen and then going on twenty seconds…he started to get worried. He was just about to speak up when she broke the silence first.

Tabitha: Is everything alright with you? You seem…“off”?

Dominic thought about it. She didn’t bullshit him. And he didn’t want to bullshit her. He had been down recently. There was a good deal of self-loathing. There were intrusive thoughts. But he honestly doubted that they were from something that they hadn’t talked about a dozen times before. She’d heard his problems. She knew what was troubling him.

Dominic: I’m fine. It’s the usual. It’s just work. It’s been stressing me out.

Tabitha: OK. And what can we do to fix that?

Dominic: I don’t know.

Tabitha: Well. Think about it. Your job clearly troubles you. It’s a constant source of stress and anxiety. It makes you question your self-worth. It makes you feel guilty and bad about yourself. Like you’re helping to erode society. Yet every time I suggest that you quit…you’re reticent. I’d ask why but you’ll simply give me another nebulous answer. So let’s start in the opposite direction. What do you like about your job working for Tommy Mack?

Dominic: It certainly pays well. It affords me a comfortable lifestyle.

Tabitha: I’ve seen the way you live. You live like a hermetic skinflint. You can afford to take a pay cut to do something that you don’t hate. It’s not like you indulge in the finer things.

Dominic: You don’t consider yourself one of the “finer things”?

Tabitha: If I thought that you were working for Tommy Mack so that you could afford me…I’d cut you off right now. That’s as bad as Lawrence Kinkaide. You have to know when to quit me.

Dominic shuttered at the sound of Kinkaide’s name. It brought his biggest failure flooding back into his mind. He thought about Kylie Cooper and Darren Smith and the mess that he’d prohibited.

Dominic: OK. So I quit my job. What would I even do?

Tabitha: What do you want to do?

Dominic: I have no idea. That’s part of the problem.

[charliesmith]

Wow, it’s nice to see Tabitha back. A nice surprise to know she worked at the No Proscenium too! It’s all coming together

[Lucky Lottie]

Just when I thought the story couldn't get any better, you bring not one but two characters out into the light. I can't wait to see where this goes.

[GreyLord]

You must have given this story a tremendous amount of thought and planning, [mention]Fandango[/mention]. The levels of complexity that you display continue to amaze. It was surprising to see Dominic as the road back to Tabitha. Now, I want to know much more about Tabitha. Well done.

[Rtj65]

Really cool chapter, fascinating to see things circle back to the heist and hear about it from a different perspective, which definitely helped make the characters involved even more well-rounded.

Plus, learning about Tabitha's involvement in the No Proscenium show was a nice surprise. There's clearly a lot more to her than meets the eye. Looking forward to the rest of the chapter!

[Fandango]

Chapter 7 - The Kink Shrink (Dominic Waller's POV) F/M [Part 2 of 2]

December 14, 2022


He saw Tabitha considering his indecisiveness and inertia in her mind, mulling it over.

Tabitha: OK. Let's start simple. What do you like to do?

Dominic: I like to golf. Do you think I should go out to Q School and try and get my tour card? Do you think they’ll let a 10 handicap play on the PGA Tour?

Tabitha smiled at him. She knew he was being difficult. But she clearly was a pro at dealing with difficult people.

Tabitha: OK. What do you realistically like to do?

Dominic: The problem, Tabitha, is that there is a large gap of “work experience” in my resume. I work as hired muscle for a loan shark. My W2 technically says that I’m in “acquisitions” for his barely legitimate antiques business. I know nothing about antiques and nothing about acquisitions other than shaking people down for debts. Those skills are not transferable.

Tabitha: You said you loved acting back in Wisconsin. You said that you played Nathan Detroit in Guys and Dolls in high school. You played Judge Turpin in Sweeney Todd in college. You’ve got acting experience.

Dominic scoffed. Was she fucking serious? She was infinitesimally more talented than he was and SHE struggled at finding success in the acting world.

Dominic: Are you serious? I think the PGA Tour was a more realistic idea.

Tabitha: I’m kind of serious. You enjoyed it, right?

He could feel one of her hands running itself playfully through his hair, teasing and tussling it. While the other traced the ropework near his hips, occassionally pausing near his butt to give it a little rub.

Dominic: Sure. I enjoyed acting. That doesn’t mean I can make a living at it. You are one of the most talented actresses I can imagine. And you’ve got gorgeous looks and a winning personality to boot. And you tell me that you get disheartened when you drive up to Los Angeles to sit in a waiting room at a casting studio with 15 other women that you claim are just as good looking and just as talented. All so that you can all battle for a part as a waitress in a low rent procedural who gets two lines.

Tabitha smirked at him. She looked a little miffed.

Tabitha: I get disheartened. But I still love it. I’m still passionate about it. Just because you don’t like your job doesn’t mean that you should try and convince me that I don’t like mine.

Dominic winced. That hadn’t been what he was trying to do.

Dominic: No no no. Tabby. That’s not what I was trying to say. I’m just not as confident as you. I’m terrible with rejection. That lifestyle is not for me. I can’t do the whole Hollywood thing.

Tabitha: So don’t do the whole Hollywood thing. Start small. Start local. Work at No Proscenium.

Dominic was shocked. He did a double take. She wanted to work with him? She wanted to be his co-worker?

Dominic: No Proscenium? Like the show that YOU work at?

Tabitha: Yes, dummy. The same place that I work on weekend evenings?

Dominic: Are they hiring?

Tabitha: We will be in a month. Ty is moving to Maine. He’s retiring. The role of Owen Grant is opening up.

Dominic: Ty? I met him at the bar that time. He’s an older black gentleman.

Tabitha: Yes.

Dominic: So how the hell am I supposed to play that part?

Tabitha: The role doesn’t call for him to be old or black. Just muscular. Ty is certainly muscular. It’s color blind casting. You’ll be fine.

Dominic: I have no experience. No credits to my name since college.

Tabitha: I’m vouching for you. You’ll audition. But I’m sure you’ll kill it. I think you’re wildly underestimating how much pull I have at this company.

Dominic: They can’t resist your charms just like the rest of us?

Tabitha: They can’t resist what a haul I am for their ticket sales. Do you think they were selling out every show before I showed up? I play a flirty femme fatale who seduces men and ties them up. AND one who is willing to get tied up and discovered by customers without complaint. A ton of actresses are jumping at the chance to take this role until they realize that they’ll be hogtied and gawked at by drunk party-goers.

Dominic was a little shocked by this.

Dominic: Wait?!? What?!? You get tied up?!?

Tabitha: Yeah. You didn’t know that?

Dominic: I don’t think it had ever come up before.

Tabitha: Yeah. It doesn’t happen all the time. Probably once every 5 shows or so. So like once every other week or so. But it’s happened on back to back nights before.

Dominic: Why does it happen some nights and not others?

Tabitha: It depends how the story is flowing. The control room tells us how to operate our flow chart. If a red guest discovers what happened to my sister and lets my character know…I get tied up. If not, I don’t.

Dominic: A red guest?

Tabitha: The guest's characters are sorted by colors depending upon which side stories they’re involved in. There are 48 guests. Six of them are “red guests”. If one of them tells me how Charlotte dies then I have to confront Owen and he ties me up. And then I get discovered by a guest ten minutes later. It’s to help stop guests from getting too much information. If they know about Charlotte’s accident then they have a piece of the puzzle and the company wants to limit access to me for a little while. So they’re less likely to connect the dots they need to. And it’s a huge thrill for whatever guest finds me. It’s a story to tell and they keep coming back for more. Hence…I’m VERY important to the company.

Dominic was listening intently. And he had certainly picked up on a certain detail.

Dominic: You said Owen gets to tie you up?

Tabitha smiled gently at him. Of course he’d followed that little bread crumb.

Tabitha: Yep.

Dominic: The same Owen that you want me to play.

Tabitha: Yep.

Dominic: And I’d get paid to tie you up?

Tabitha: You’d get paid to act in a show. Show up early for run-throughs and costume and makeup. The whole shebang. And Yes. You’d be tying me up approximately 20% of shows.

Dominic: I’d get paid $300 to tie you up. Basically the same rate the I used to pay YOU to tie YOU up before I fucked things up and lost those privileges.

Tabitha: Yep.

Dominic: You’re telling me that this Ty guy gets paid to do that and he’s retiring to Maine? What is wrong with that guy? He’s giving up the sweetest gig anybody has ever heard of.

Tabitha: Well. Ty is gay. So it’s a little different.

Dominic: Still. He might be gay. But he’s not dead. I’d still call it a perk of the job.

Tabitha: Can I assume that this sweetens the pot enough for you to consider the offer?

Dominic: I had already considered the offer. I was already a Yes.

Tabitha: Great. So that settles it. You have a new job now.

Dominic: I thought you said I had to audition?

Tabitha: You do. But you’ll get the job.

Dominic: I still can’t quit my day job. $300 a show is pretty good. But $900 a week isn’t going to cut it in San Diego County. I’ll be out on my ass in no time.

Tabitha: We don’t need you to quit immediately. Just to ween you off of that job. No Proscenium will open other doors for you. Better doors. Doors that don’t make you wake up covered in sweat at night. Is leaving Tommy’s outfit going to be a problem? Will he take it in a bad way?

Dominic: You mean…will he have me whacked?

Tabitha: Kind of.

Dominic: No, Tabby. This isn’t the mafia. It’s not that I can’t get out. I can leave whenever I want. He’ll want some notice, but he’ll let me walk.

Tabitha: Great. So what else is bothering you?

Dominic: You already know the answer to that. The same thing that’s always bothering me.

Tabitha: Guilt?

Dominic: Not sure I’ll ever be rid of it. I’m not sure that I SHOULD ever be rid of it.

He felt Tabitha soften. Her hands relaxed themselves and rubbed him soothingly as she pulled him into a tighter embrace.

Tabitha: I’m not saying that you need to forgive yourself. Maybe a little guilt is good. It makes you more responsible. Less likely to let circumstances reproduce themselves like last time. Maybe don’t totally forgive yourself. But there’s nothing that you can do for those students at this point without turning yourself in. You don’t want to do that. I don’t want YOU to do that. So you may as well stop letting it rule your thoughts. The way that you help those students is by making sure that you live a more careful, thoughtful, purpose driven life from here on out.

Dominic: Sounds reasonable. I’ll take it under consideration.

Tabitha: That’s all I ask. Baby steps. You don’t need to quit your job tomorrow. We can ease you out of it. But getting you involved in other things is the first step. But you’ll take the role of Owen Grant?

Dominic: Am I being offered the role?

Tabitha: Listen. I don’t have casting power. But I ALMOST do. You’re ostensibly being offered the role.

Dominic: I’ll take it.

Tabitha: Excellent. This calls for a celebration.

Dominic was intrigued. The turn of events today was very much to his liking. He treasured spending time with Tabitha. He knew that his relationship was that of a client. But now she wanted to make him a co-worker. Maybe even a friend. He wanted to see what her idea of a celebration might be.

Dominic: A celebration? What did you have in mind, my mmmmmmmmpppppphhhhhhhh!!!!!!!!!!

There it was. He should have known. He felt her palm push a thick pair of cotton socks into his open mouth. He didn’t see them coming but even without visualizing the socks he could somehow tell that they were his own. He had been on his feet all day before coming to see Tabitha and the taste of his own sweat and dirt was unpleasant. She’d gotten him good. She’d been so loving and gentle. But Tabitha always did like to mix in a good “Gotcha”.

Dominic: Nnnnmmmmmmmppppphhhhhhhh!!!!! Hhhhhmmmmmmppppphhhhhhhmmmmrrrmmmmmm!!!!!!!!!

Tabitha: I’ll tell you what kind of celebration. I was thinking we could do dinner.

Dominic: Hhhmmmmmpprppphhhrrrmmmmppphhhhhhmmmmmmmmmmm.

Tabitha: A nice dinner. I was thinking The Marine Room.

Dominic: Mmmmpppphhhh hhhmmmmppphhhhmmmmpppphhhhhhhhh.

Tabitha: Since I got you a new job I think it’s only fair that you’ll be treating. Don’t you think?

Dominic: Mmmmmmpppphhhhhhhrrmmmmmpppphhhh hhhhhhhmmmmpppphhhhhh nnnnnmmmpppphhhhhhhhhh.

Tabitha: Yeah. You treating sounds good to me. After all, you still have your six figure salary job for now. And Momma really could go for some diver scallops. Ooohhhh. And their ginger dacquoise. I haven’t had that in forever. Sounds good to me. What do you say?

Dominic: Mmmmmpppppphhhhhhhrrmmmmpppphhhhhh hhhhhhmmmmpppphhhhhhhhh.

It’s not like he was a position to argue. But even if he was entirely unbound and uncompromised he would have said Yes. He certainly had trouble saying No to Tabitha. Call him a sucker. But he found that he habitually wanted to please her. Tabitha was stroking his side with her hand affectionately. He felt her fingers start to walk their way down his obliques until they were on the hollow of his hip. She then slid them into his boxer shorts giving him quite a start.

Dominic: Mmmmmmpppphhhhhhhhhh????

She settled her hand right up against his genitals and leaned in to whisper seductively into his ear.

Tabitha: I’ll tell you what I’M going to do. I’m going to take a nice, LONG shower. I’m going to get myself ready for dinner. You can hang out here and do whatever it is you do while you’re tied up. Maybe engage in some more self-loathing over mistakes you made in the past that you can’t do anything to fix at this point. If that’s what you want to do. When I’m good and ready…I’ll come back and untie you and you can make yourself presentable for dinner. Then we’re going to celebrate your new gig with a delicious meal. But when we get back here afterwards, I’m afraid that we’re going to have to start rehearsals. You see…I’m vouching for you. I need to know that you can play the part. I’m not worried about your ability to act like Owen or remember the storylines. No. There’s another important aspect that I want to rehearse. You’re going to have to tie ME up some nights. And I need to make sure that you’ve still got it.

Dominic immediately felt himself getting aroused. Just the thought of Tabitha tightly bound and gagged was sending his libido into overdrive.

Tabitha: Oh. Getting excited, are we? Well, it’s been a LONG time since you’ve had me in ropes. We’re going to have to make sure that you’ve still got the goods. Customers won’t settle for shoddy ropework. It really makes the immersion. So we’re going to have to make sure that your knots are up to standard and that your cinches are TIGHT.

The words literally dripped off her tongue into his ear canal. She was putting extra spank on them and it was getting him hard. She withdrew her hand from his underwear and gave him a playful swat on his ass. She certainly knew how to toy with him. She then slid herself out from underneath him as his head fell off of her lap and returned to the sofa. He watched with rapt attention as she sauntered out of the room until he heard the shower turn on. He didn’t know where this road led. But he was glad to be back on it. Was he absolutely deluding himself that he might actually have a shot with Tabitha. He was a paying customer. Was she just stringing him along and keeping him on the hook? But then why would she try to get him to leave a job that allowed him to afford the finer things like her? He certainly needed to get out of the game. Tommy Mack had been good to him. But it wasn’t good FOR him. He didn’t like hurting people. A life of crime didn’t suit him. He settled into Tabitha’s soft, leather couch. He was barely thinking about his sore muscles that ached from the strain that the rope was putting on them. He hardly noticed the foul taste of his own filthy socks in his mouth. His mind was drifting to thoughts of Tabitha bound and gagged. He’d had her that way once. And he was apparently about to be gifted a second chance. He could see the way the rope dug into her creamy soft skin. The ropes that would contour her body and accentuate all of the natural bodily gifts with which Tabby had been blessed. He could see the way that gag would settle into her mouth, pulling the corners back and turning her eloquent diction into muted unintelligible moans and grunts. The way that her useless mouth would force her to turn to other means of communication. The way that her eyes would speak to him for all that they were worth in the absence of the ability to speak. They’d beseech him with a language all their own. Yes. Dominic didn’t know where this road was heading…but he couldn’t wait to find out.

[AUTHOR'S NOTE: Sorry for the delay. I thought I could complete the second part of this chapter BEFORE I left for my trip abroad. Turns out I was wrong. But I'm back now and will continue posting on both stories. Capture Club will resume tomorrow.]

[Caesar73]

So good you are back [mention]Fandango[/mention] !! Intriguing chapter I must say - as always. And I wonder if Thabita gets tied up by Dominic in due course

[GreyLord]

It was worth the wait. Neat twist, A F/M tug discussing reversing the roles into a M/F. Very interesting.

[charliesmith]

Happy to see you back again!

Enjoyed this latest update. Tabitha is such a beautiful and amazing character. I am falling in love with her. Haha!

[Rtj65]

Great to see you back, hope you enjoyed your trip! I really enjoyed this part, seeing how both Tabitha and Dominic are moving on from the earlier events in the story. It's not a dynamic that I expected to crop up again, but I'm glad that it has.

Dominic didn’t know where this road was heading…but he couldn’t wait to find out.

This line sums up exactly how I feel, too. Great job!

[Fandango]

Thanks for reading. Sorry about the extended break in the middle of last chapter while I gallivanted around Europe. And as per usual, thank you for all the comments and feedback.

Just when I thought the story couldn't get any better, you bring not one but two characters out into the light. I can't wait to see where this goes.

I appreciate it. Once I introduce a character, I'm never just going to forget about them. Sometimes they might not make a return appearance, but oftentimes they will. And Tabitha and Dominic definitely still have parts to play in the story going forward.

You must have given this story a tremendous amount of thought and planning, [mention]Fandango[/mention]. The levels of complexity that you display continue to amaze. It was surprising to see Dominic as the road back to Tabitha. Now, I want to know much more about Tabitha. Well done.

Thank you. I've got a small series of "Kaleidoscope" stories that I've written (four at present). Because the narrators and POVs are constantly shifting and the stories are interconnected, it's important that I know where I'm going. So I do storyboard all of these stories before I ever start writing them. That's not the case with single narrator stories like Capture Club where I'm not trying to connect a bunch of threads.

Really cool chapter, fascinating to see things circle back to the heist and hear about it from a different perspective, which definitely helped make the characters involved even more well-rounded.

Plus, learning about Tabitha's involvement in the No Proscenium show was a nice surprise. There's clearly a lot more to her than meets the eye. Looking forward to the rest of the chapter!

Yeah. I didn't really expect people to just assume that Tabitha and Hazel were the same person. I made the descriptions match up (tall, red hair, green eyes, alluring beauty) but not enough that people would think that they're the same person. You also can't really draw too much about Tabitha's characterization from her appearance in Chapter 5 because she's playing a role there. Technically she was playing a role in Chapter 3. And she might be playing one in Chapter 7. Tabitha will eventually get a POV chapter and we'll find out who she is and what she's about.

So good you are back [mention]Fandango[/mention] !! Intriguing chapter I must say - as always. And I wonder if Thabita gets tied up by Dominic in due course

I don't have a problem spoiling this quandary. Dominic will tie up Tabitha in a future chapter. Both Dominic and Tabitha will find themselves both in the role of captor and captive again before the story is over.

Happy to see you back again!

Enjoyed this latest update. Tabitha is such a beautiful and amazing character. I am falling in love with her. Haha!

Well then you'll be glad to hear that there is a good amount more of Tabitha to come. This story is 12 chapters and was designed so that the four main characters (Lexi, Brendan, Julie, and Tabitha) will each appear in four of the six chapters. They've each appeared in three thus far and only Brendan and Julie have had their POV chapters...so there is a lot more Tabitha coming down the pipe.


I appreciate all of you reading the story. I'll start posting Chapter 8 in the middle of next week (probably Wednesday).

[Fandango]

[AUTHOR'S NOTE / WARNING:] I wanted to give a warning before this chapter to prepare readers for potential content that they might find unsavory. The first part of this chapter will be light on kink and heavy on background story. There is no dialogue. However, the second half of this chapter will be very sexually explicit. More explicit than the early parts of Chapter 6, in my mind. All sexual conduct in this chapter will be enthusiastically consensual between fully cognitive adults who love each other. However, I'm fully aware that all of you read these stories for very different reasons and some of you might not be as interested in gratuitous sexual content or find it distasteful. Therefore, if you think that you will find graphic descriptions of naked human anatomy and genitals, bodily excretions, or poorly written sexual activities by a male author from the female POV to be not your speed...you are welcome to skip the second half of this chapter. I promise I won't throw too much plot into that section.

Chapter 8 - New Year, New Me (Jessica Huff's POV) F/M [Part 1 of 2]

December 31, 2022


Jessica Huff reclined on her bed as the clock hit 11:00pm, signaling that the year 2022 had only a single hour remaining in the Pacific Time Zone. She watched Miley Cyrus host the New Year’s Eve party program that was currently on her television. She began to wonder if her generation just kind of got skipped in the whole scheme of things. It felt like Dick Clark had been hosting New Year’s Eve programs up until a decade ago, though she was pretty sure that if she actually bothered to look it up he’d probably ceded hosting responsibilities in the early 2000s. And to Jessica, Dick Clark had always been old. Ever since she’d first seen him. And now Millennials that were two decades her junior were hosting. It felt to her like Generation X had just kind of been skipped over. She supposed that Ryan Seacrest was Gen X…but there was something so “uncanny valley” about him. She wasn’t a fan. But seeing the torch get passed in this way did make her wonder if she had gotten old and not really noticed.

Jessica Huff had turned 50 in 2022. She still felt young. Everybody told her that she still looked young. And she didn’t think that they were lying to her. But it was A LOT more work than it used to be. The intense daily workouts, the highly regulated diet, the moisturizing creams, the meditation…staying young and healthy was a chore. But she found that she was somehow happier now than she’d ever been. Life was good…whether she was still a spring chicken or not. The main thing that made her think that she might be getting old was the fact that this was her third consecutive New Year’s Eve at home with her husband. In December 2020, they’d decided to stay home because of a global pandemic that had made it seem ill-advised to go and mingle in close quarters with friends and strangers. But then last year they’d just done it voluntarily. And she didn’t know how she’d felt about it. She felt like she should be out amongst the world. But this year they were both lying in bed again as the new year approached and she was entirely at peace with the decision. It felt right.

It wasn’t that she didn’t enjoy big, bold New Years plans. She loved them. One of her most treasured memories was her trip with Greg to Iceland for New Years the year before her eldest daughter, Lexi, was born. Reykjavik goes ABSOLUTELY insane for New Year’s. She’d never seen a fireworks spectacle like that. It wasn’t just government entities or corporations sponsoring a show. It was damn near every citizen of the country firing off their own Disney-grade fireworks. It was amazing. They’d made a week out of it. They’d traveled the Golden Circle, walked on a glacier, bathed in natural hot springs, and seen the Northern Lights. But as they started a family and the years progressed, New Years became just another holiday. They’d driven up to Pasadena to see the Tournament of Roses parade with the girls a couple of times. Usually whenever their Nittany Lions were playing in the Rose Bowl. But usually New Years consisted of her and Greg just going out to a party, doing a little mingling, kissing when the clock struck midnight, and going home shortly thereafter.

Still, New Years was Jessica’s favorite holiday. It always had been, and she thought that it always would be. It was about hope and renewal and self-reflection. And it was about self-improvement and making conscious choices to make changes in one's life and try new things. It was the perfect time for a reset. Reflect on the person that you were in the last year and actively decide how you’d like to be a different person in the next one. She and Greg always made New Years resolutions and they pushed each other throughout the year to make sure that they stuck with them. Sometimes the aim was self-improvement. Sometimes the aim was fun and adventure. But this year’s biggest change for them could best be illustrated by her husband, Greg, who was lying on the bed next to her. Jessica was cuddling up next to her beloved, adoring husband. Her left arm nestled along his back. Her right arm draped over his navel. Her silky smooth, freshly shaven legs intertwined around his strong, muscular definitely unshaven right leg. And her head resting delicately on his right pectoral muscle. His coarse, untamed chest hair was tickling the side of her face. And her head rose ever so slightly and fell with his chest as he breathed heavily in and out…rising and falling. She pulled her head back for a second to look him over. It was a sight that she still wasn’t used to, even after a couple of months. And it still sent tingles through her body.

Greg was securely bound to the bed. Each of his ankles were tightly tethered to one of the posts at the foot of the bed. His wrists were pulled up over his head and tied together and tightly lashed to the head board. It was some of her best work, which had gone through rapid improvement over the last two months. She was sure that Greg was noticing that she was getting quite good at this. He had been shifting his limbs to test her bonds and probably knew that he wasn’t going anywhere. Not that he could enjoy her ropework with his eyes, as of present. She had affixed a leather blindfold over her husband’s eyes, effectively removing his sense of sight. There was also a padded bit gag in this mouth. It was one of the more moderate gags that she had in her small collection. A New Year’s Treat for him to get a reprieve from the more cumbersome ball gag that he often wore. It also was more sustainably comfortable, so she could keep it in his mouth longer. Which she saw as a plus. She had now purchased six gags from various online retailers that she kept in the bottom drawer of her dresser. The first three purchased the first night that they had talked about incorporating this sort of thing into their bedroom back in October. While the padded bit gag may have been more forgiving than some of the others, it certainly kept him quiet enough. It was appropriately sized. It fit his mouth well. As did most of their gags. Jessica was pretty sure that she’d known right away that she would prefer the dominant role when it came to their BDSM games. But this was an exploration and she wanted to kick the tires on. She wanted all sorts of role plays and scenarios. So there was also a ball gag in the drawer that was fitted especially for her. She’d measured with calipers to get the dimensions just right.

She had to admit…she was really into this. And she knew that she was immensely lucky to such an accommodating husband such as Greg who was willing to indulge her in this increasingly rapid journey of self-discovery into kink. But she was pretty sure that he was legitimately learning to enjoy it. And if he wasn’t, she was confident that he was assertive enough to let her know when lines needed to be drawn. They’d had a couple of those that they’d stumbled upon already through trial and error. She was pretty sure that neither of them were interested in trying hot wax play again. But hey, you live and you learn. And they were definitely still figuring out what the other did and didn’t like. She had been surprised that Greg seemed to be a little more into the whole idea of humiliation and degradation than she’d thought. She wasn’t so sure that it was for her. But it might be growing on her. She loved to mock Greg and belittle him when she had him in ropes. And he’d return some of that sass in turn when the roles were reversed. He was full of cheeky condescending little barbs that he’d throw out as he was stuffing a pair of panties in her mouth or groping her exposed breasts with her hands uselessly box tied behind her back. And the indignity of it would always frustrate her and make her blood boil just a little bit. But it also did stir something inside of her. And it definitely riled her up. And Greg liked her riled up. And she realized that she liked to be riled up. Because in a way it was Greg giving her revenge fuel…and that was always welcome.

While she certainly enjoyed being the one in control more often, and she was pretty sure that Greg enjoyed being under her dominion more…there was certainly value for them in switching. They could play off of the various torments and indignities that the other inflicted. It felt like it kept things honest and fun. It never turned mean spirited. But there were consequences to every torment that you inflicted on your partner. And Jessica enjoyed living in a world with consequences. It made the stakes feel more real and enjoyable. The captor could do as they pleased, but they had to know in the back of their mind that their chickens might be coming home to roost before too long. That made things thrilling.

And while Greg was a fan of private humiliation…he certainly did not approve of public humiliation. His insistence that no trace or word of what they do in the bedroom leave their bedroom was entirely understandable and something that she had no problem respecting. She would love to be able to talk about it with people. This was a new rapidly-evolving part of herself that she’d like to parse out with people. But she’d read up enough on the culture and best practices of what she and Greg were getting involved in, and she knew that Rule #1 was respecting your partner’s limits. And absolute privacy was clearly one of Greg’s major limits. She understood it. What they were doing carried a lot of stigma to it. She just hoped that he wasn’t embarrassed by it. She did LIKE embarrassing him, but in the short term. Not the long term. She really did need him to know that there was nothing to be ashamed of about having your wife tie you up and dominate you. Quite the opposite actually. She didn’t respect him less because he gave himself over into her power. She respected him more. But he was still learning about all of this just like she was. And she was very surprised that he was amenable to it, given what he’d said about it only three months ago.

Greg had been FURIOUS when he’d found out that their oldest daughter, Lexi, had been engaging in bondage related activities at work. He’d called it “perverse” and “deviant” and “hedonistic”. He was on the war path. She’d agreed with him that Lexi was being reckless and foolhardy in terms of her choice of venue for her kink related activities. But she didn’t appreciate his attitudes towards the fact that their daughter might be into this sort of thing. Jessica didn’t know how much she’d enjoy it at the time, but she always wanted her daughters to be happy. She understood a good portion of why Greg had been upset, but didn’t agree with all of this thoughts on the matter at the time. Greg had been railing over the fact that Lexi’s friend Drew had been tying her up as part of the escape room. To be fair, Lexi had been tying Drew up also. But if Drew had been in the room with them, Greg probably would have skinned the poor young man alive. Jessica knew Drew well. He’d been one of Lexi’s dearest friends for a long time and had been over to the Huff household at least 100 times. Jessica liked him very much. And she knew well enough to know that there was NO way that Drew had talked her daughter into anything that she didn’t want to do. Drew might be funny and empathetic and loyal and trustworthy…but persuasive and adventurous were definitely NOT two adjectives that Jessica would attach to him. She was sure that this whole debacle had been her daughter’s idea. And naturally…she was right.

Lexi had made that point VERY clear to her father. He wasn’t happy. He still felt hurt and betrayed. But they managed to calm him down enough to discuss things rationally with him. They’d talked about why Lexi had done what she’d done. They’d talked about how it was benefitting the business. And Greg asserted himself and laid down some smart, common sense rules. She was glad to see them coming eye to eye on the matter. She loved the fact that Lexi and Greg were working together on the escape room. It was important to her that they had something to bond over. They both loved puzzles and games. But Greg didn’t have as easy a relationship with Lexi as he did with their younger daughter, Julie. And the escape room really had been fixing that.

Jessica and Greg loved their daughters equally. Greg was a great father and had done wonders to provide a very comfortable lifestyle for their family. But in order to do that, he’d had to work A LOT during his kid’s childhoods. Every weekday for about 10 years he’d left for work at 6:00 in the morning and often wasn’t home until 9:00 in the evening. He’d had the weekends. But he’d missed a lot of dinners and piano recitals and soccer games and honors assemblies. He’d made himself make time for the really big ones. But the girls no doubt noticed that their friends’ fathers were around a lot more than theirs. But his work ethic allowed them to easily pay the mortgage and drive nice, well-maintained cars, and send their kids to private school. They had been saving up and he was hoping to go into semi-retirement by the time he was 50 in order to have more free time for his family. And then Lexi got a full ride to university. College was a major expenditure that they had been saving for. Tuition and room and board costs kept skyrocketing and they’d thought they’d have to save more and more to make sure that they were covered. They’d saved $250,000 for Lexi’s college education. And now that money was suddenly freed up. Greg could step back from the software company more and use it as more passive income. He’d spent Lexi’s entire high school career being able to attend her school plays and speech and debate tournaments and improv comedy shows very sparingly. And now just as she had graduated, he was now able to attend every one of Julie’s soccer games and cheerleader events and student government fundraisers. They knew that Lexi understood. But it had to sting a little bit. It had been her studious nature that had allowed for this newfound freedom. And she wasn’t reaping nearly as many of the benefits of it. She was off at college.

Lexi obviously held no grudges. But Julie had been able to build a closer relationship with her father while she was still in high school. And now the escape room business was allowing Greg and Lexi to bond over a shared passion. Jessica knew that Greg was more than a little bummed that his best friend had moved to Georgia the previous year. But the fact that Lexi was now his right hand and was actively taking on a major role in the production of their second room was HUGE for the development of their relationship. Jessica loved the way that they talked shop and laughed and got all giddy about the project. And she wasn’t sure that that would be the same if Dean was still local. Though she did miss Dean and his wife Lynn. And she knew that Greg really missed them. Making new friends in your 50s is tough. She knew that all too well. Which is why she understood that Greg wanted to protect their current reputation. She was not allowed to engage in any girl talk with their friends about her new found obsession.

She legitimately had had no clue that she would be THIS into bondage. When she’d heard about Lexi and Drew and the other employees of CryptIQ Escapes getting tied up she’d been a little aghast. Not as mad as Greg…but she’d understood his anger. She definitely hadn’t thought of it as a sexy thing at the time. She remembers the night when it fully hit her that this was something that might very well be for her. The date was October 28, 2022. A mere two months ago. Lexi had taken Greg to a show called No Proscenium to try and show him that her ill-advised addition to the escape room might have some merit to it. Greg had agreed to hear her out and in doing so had inadvertently launched the two of them into their current whirlwind of kink, bondage, and submission. Greg had been kidnapped in the course of the show and Lexi had sent Jessica a picture of the debacle. Jessica had a hard time contextualizing just what kind of switch had been flicked inside her. But staring at her husband so helpless with his mouth stuffed and gagged was something that she’d never known that she’d needed until that moment. And it took her by surprise. She didn’t know WHY she needed it. She loved her husband. He could be a bit of a bluster bug, but he never belittled her or lorded power over her. They shared an equal amount of authority and mutual respect within the Huff household. So why did she enjoy seeing him so helpless and pitiful? If she was honest it made her feel a little guilty. But there was no denying the tingle that it had given her. More than a tingle really. A minor quake more like.

Her breathing had gotten shallow and her body had flooded with sensations. She recognized that bondage was a sexual thing for some people, but hadn’t thought of it as being a trigger for herself. Yet here she was. 50 years old and still finding out shit about herself. She’d leaned into the taboo stigma of bondage and sent her daughter an emoji response that she and Greg jokingly referred to as “thirsty face”. She’d meant it as joke. She’d hoped that her daughter would laugh. The response that came a moment later was the vomiting emoji. It was hard to tell what Lexi was really thinking, but Jessica cringed a little bit. She probably shouldn’t have sent her daughter such an impertinent text response. Talk about T.M.I. She’d hoped that Lexi would take it as a joke. She could surely respond to Lexi that she was only joking. She considered doing so. But then she had to confront within herself that that wouldn’t be an intellectually honest response. She’d sent it as a joke to mask the fact that it WASN’T a joke. That was how she felt. The sight of her restrained and silenced husband DID make her thirsty. Not that she wanted her daughter to think that. But correcting the record now would probably be seen by Greg. And she didn’t want him to think that this was something that she DIDN’T want. There was something here. She’d only discovered it about 90 seconds ago. But the surge in hormones was potent and powerful. Would this be something that he’d be willing to try? Probably not. He’d said some very firmly dismissive things about kink and bondage when he was berating Lexi. That would be difficult to backtrack from. But she wasn’t sure that she could just let it go and not at least try to satiate herself with an inquiry. She’d have to be cautious about it. But she was secretly wondering if this was a bridge that they could cross into.

Long story short…they’d crossed the bridge. They’d crossed it hard and they were well on the other side of it. They were here. With Greg stretched out tightly trussed and completely naked on their bed sporting a leather blindfold and a padded bit gag. And her in her skivvies cuddling up next to her beloved little pet. “Pet”. That was how she referred to him. They’d gone through all sorts of terms and words. They’d used the word “slave”. They’d both HATED it. It didn’t sit well with either of them. “Sub” also didn’t feel right. They wanted something that was a little cuter. A little hokier. That took some of the edge off. They were more about teasing and frustrating than they were about actual torment and discomfort. “Pet” worked for them. For now. They were still both finding their way. And Jessica had been concerned about her ability to find her way. She’d wanted to understand herself. The WHY of this whole fascination was something that deeply interested her. She had so many questions. So many thoughts and feelings that she wanted to bounce around and figure out. She could bounce them around with Greg. But he fully admitted that he knew less than she did. She’d scoured the internet for articles and opinions, but there really was no substitution for talking about it in open conversation with somebody that you trusted. And per her agreement with Greg…that was not something that they were going to do. She was going to live with that. Or so she thought. Greg was full of surprises.

The change had come on her birthday: December 14th. The girls had both come over. They’d gone out for a nice dinner. Just the four of them. She’d come home and they had presented her with an array of presents. Wonderful, thoughtful gifts. She really was a very lucky woman. Greg had given her a beautiful pair of sapphire earrings. And when the girls had left, Lexi driving Julie back to campus, she and Greg retired to the bedroom for a little birthday fun. But before they got started he presented her with an envelope that he’d said was her “real present”. She was exceedingly intrigued. The earrings had certainly been a real present. What could be in this envelope? She opened it slowly and carefully giving her husband a mischievous smile. And she was more than a little shocked by what she saw.

[charliesmith]

Jessica Huff is a welcome addition. I wonder how her character would pan out in the grand scheme of things.

[GreyLord]

Jessica is a nice new addition. Interesting insight into her thinking.

[Rtj65]

It certainly seemed like a chapter focussing on Jessica and Greg was in the works after the latter's earlier appearance, and I'm glad to see that's the case. You did a good job providing a lot of background and insight into both of them this part without it dragging on, and a lot of Jessica's reflections seemed very relatable. Also, there's something really funny about Jessica and Greg's initial disapproval of what Lexi was doing, while having no idea about Julie's own actions. Looking forward to finding out what was in the envelope!

[Fandango]

[AUTHOR'S NOTE: It's been WAY longer than I intended between parts due to increased duties in my outside life. So I'd like to remind anybody intending to read this next part...that it will be GRAPHICALLY sexual. I might spend 1000 words on a single sex act in detail that nobody asked for. Please be advised.]

Chapter 8 - New Year, New Me (Jessica Huff's POV) F/M [Part 2 of 2]

December 31, 2022


It was a voucher for a class that Greg had purchased. The class was for the following Saturday. The 17th. She’d been floored. This was not a private class. This was a public class. Specifically it was a couples shibari class. A female instructor taught interested couples the basics of shibari. Jessica was floored. Greg had always insisted that they be very private about this new adventure that they were embarking on. But this class was out in the open. She highly doubted that they’d see anybody that they knew there. But it was a step in the public direction. And yet she was ecstatic. This was such a phenomenal present. How did he find it? How did he know? She had so many questions. And Greg answered them. He’d noticed that this part of their personal lives was definitely something that Jessica was missing and something that she wanted to explore. But for reasons that they both could admit were obvious, he didn’t want the stigma that came with it within their current social circle. So he’d reached out to another couple that that he knew that had similar tastes. Their names were Anthony and Carla.

He’d had to go through old escape room manifests to find their contact information. That’s something that he really wasn’t supposed to be doing. But he’d figured that they wouldn’t mind. And he was right. He figured that Jessica could use some like-minded people to discuss the sensations and cravings that she was experiencing. She needed people that could help get her head around why she felt the way that she felt and could guide her towards leaning into it in a manner that would be healthy for her, Greg, and their relationship. He also saw that her rope skills were not where she wanted them to be. She tied him up much regularly than he tied her up. But he was significantly better at it than she was. Macramé didn’t really prepare somebody to tie up a person. It didn’t prepare you for how to secure muscle groups and alter kinesiology. A little practice and instruction should help to get her where she was looking to go in respect to truly making her husband helpless.

She’d been a bundle of nervous energy for their first class. But it had been so fun. Anthony and Carla were so sweet. And their enthusiasm for the whole lifestyle made her feel normal. They seemed normal. Maybe she was normal. Not…THAT normal. But it certainly quelled a lot of her concerns. They also knew two of the other couples that were attending the class. There were six couples in total. It was intimate, but social. And it had been so fun and invigorating. The instructor, Melinda, was exceedingly skilled but also very encouraging. Jessica knew that her own ropework was not great, but Melinda assured her that she had a good enough grasp of the basics and helped her with the things that she needed to work on. While Jessica was now convinced that learning to tie people up was definitely for her, she still wasn’t sure that she felt comfortable in ropes…physically or mentally. There was a certain je no se quo about the whole thing that just made it apprehensive for her. She was very overwrought about it. She wasn’t sure if it was a societal thing or a mental block that was all her own. She’d let Greg tie her up. But she trusted Greg to see her like that. He'd held her hand through two childbirths and seen her in a wide variety of unflattering situations. And he still looked at her like he was a goddess. She wasn’t sure why she didn’t want other people her seeing her tied up, but the thought of it still made her stomach flutter.

So when Melinda had asked for volunteers the first two times to demonstrate a technique she had hung back and not volunteered. Carla had volunteered the first time. And a nice gentleman named Laurent had stepped up the second time. This was fine with her. She probably would learn better by watching. There was no pressure to put herself out there. But as the class wound to a close, Melinda wanted to show the class a more aspirational tie that they could hope to achieve if they stuck with things. She looked directly at Jessica and asked her if she could use her as a model since she had seen in the practice sessions just how flexible she was. Jessica couldn’t argue. She was exceedingly flexible. And now all those years of yoga and pilates was coming back to potentially embarrass her. She couldn’t say No. To be clear, she absolutely could say No. This seemed like a very low key, accepting group. But she didn’t want to have to say No. This should be something that she was OK with. They were here to learn and engage in the shared knowledge and artistry of kink. So she’d walked up to the front of the studio…with no small amount of trepidation in her gait. And then Melinda had begun to tie her.

She was now the model. And having the ropes wind themselves around her should have presented her with a new form of kinesthetic learning. But she couldn’t focus on the knots. She was too far inside her head. And she could feel the eyes of everybody else in the class boring holes through her. She thought that it must be humiliating. Having them see her bound and helpless. But…it wasn’t. Not even slightly. There was no judgement in their gaze. There was wonder. There was admiration. It felt invigorating. Empowering. As the ropes pressed into her, she began to become flushed with a natural high that she was not expecting. She let her mind wander and drank in the euphoric feeling. She barely noticed that a question had been asked and Melinda rotated her so that one of her classmates could get a better look at part of the ropework. She had been so apprehensive to be the one that was bound. To be vulnerable and helpless, but she almost regretted the fact that she was being untied when Melinda started to release her from the ropes. Shortly afterwards the class was over. She felt that she’d managed to soak up a decent amount about actual ropework. But she had SO many questions about the psychology of it all. That was what was really weighing on her.

She was even more excited when Carla and Anthony asked if she and Greg could join them for margaritas afterwards. This was EXACTLY what she needed. She’d peppered them both with an INSANE amount of questions. And they’d graciously and magnanimously answered all of them. Enthusiastically so. She’d asked them about practical tying techniques, tenable position limits, and which gags were most effective. She asked them where they sourced the best materials and toys. But the questions that she found most important were in regards to how bondage and kink augmented their relationship. Her relationship with her husband was very important. And while she definitely wanted to tie him up and torment the ever-living shit out of him…she didn’t want that to grate on their relationship. And she wasn’t entirely sure HOW it wouldn’t. And they were very helpful in this respect.

Knowing your partner was key. And even with this familiarity communication was exceedingly important. You had to know that you could trust your partner. And that went both ways. Domme and sub. Captor and captive. And there was also something that she needed to really look into called aftercare. She knew about aftercare. Of course she did. That was in the very basics of her reading. But how it looked and why it was necessitated varied. Carla and Anthony had their own system. They were both switches and they employed a system they called the Rental Car System. Much like fuel in a rental car, your partner comes with a certain capacity of ego and self-esteem. Any degradation or humiliation or taunting or torment that you inflict is fine within the boundaries of your agreed upon limits. However, when everything is said and done…you’re responsible for filling the self-esteem back up before your done. Much like a rental car’s fuel tank. Jessica thought that this was pretty neat. And it’s definitely something that had stuck with her. She really liked her new kink friends. And they’d become “real” friends. She and Greg would be going to brunch with Carla and Anthony and Tina and Theo (another couple in the group) later this week.

Now she had people that she could talk to about all sorts of thoughts and questions that would flood her mind whenever she and Greg had a play session. She looked over at Greg. He looked so helpless and worn out. She’d given him a good go of torment earlier this evening. But he’d helped facilitate all of this. He was, in a way, the architect of his own demise. She definitely thought there was a part of it that he loved though. And he’d been such a good little pet that she thought that maybe they should finish this session before the New Year hit…with a little treat. Not just a treat for him, she was going to enjoy it just as much as he was. Jessica looked down at her husband’s semi-erect penis. It had been fully erect a fraction of an hour ago while they were playing. But during their respite it had calmed down a little bit. It was time to change that.

Jessica reached behind Greg’s head and removed his blindfold. She positioned herself directly in front of him so that the first thing that his eyes would settle upon would be her mischievous gaze and smile. As she stripped away the blindfold she saw his beautiful blue eyes blink rapidly as they adjusted to the changing light. But eventually they settled into hers. His eyes were so deep and expressive and bright. And while she gave him an active, sincere smile with her lips…she saw him smile back with his eyes. Jessica thought that all sorts of eyes were sexy. Blue, Brown, Green, Grey…but there was just something about the bright blue of Greg’s eyes that she had always aroused her to no end. There was a depth to them. She loved going swimming in them. And they were so expressive. Greg’s mouth was thoroughly gagged at the moment. The padded bit was shoved between his supple lips, really stopping up his speech. But Jessica knew all too well that his eyes could communicate exactly what he wanted. And right now they were pleading and expectant and desperate for her to do exactly what she was already planning on doing. His eyes had a thirst to them imploring her to give him a treat. A treat for obeying her every command this evening. Of course she was going to oblige. How could she not? But the thing that he still didn’t understand, despite being told multiple times, was that it wasn’t just a treat for him. She was going to enjoy this also. She was never convinced that he really understood that. How much she thoroughly enjoyed what was about to come next.

She gave him a sultry wink. And he immediately let her know that her flirty display was landing. He leaned back in anticipation and his breathing started to accelerate. She’d removed his blindfold, because this was something that he LOVED to watch. Specifically he loved eye contact. So she locked her bright blue eyes to his as she lowered herself down awkwardly towards his very erect penis. She tried to maintain her mischievous smile the whole time, though she did crack laughing a little bit as she came down too far to the left in her effort to maintain eye contact. She gave him one more wink as she wrapped her mouth around the head of his penis. He let out a satisfied guttural groan. She lowered her mouth down the shaft, having to break eye contact as his penis contacted the soft palette of the back of her throat. She slid her lips up and down the shaft of his cock several times, pressing and massaging the underbelly of his shaft with her tongue. He moaned euphorically as she worked his vulnerable member.
She softly contracted her cheeks and pushed as much of the moisture that she’d built up in her mouth towards the center, using her tongue to baste her husband’s penis in saliva…really getting it lubricated. It had been a long night. He would soon be ready to explode. But he wasn’t quite there yet. She could almost feel the powerful load that he was storing in reserve. But he hadn’t started to pulse yet. They’d been married for more than 25 years now. She’d given him easily over 1000 blowjobs by now. She knew her way around his cock like it was a vehicle she’d driven for decades. She knew how to start it up and how to shift it’s gears. And right now she was driving it like an Italian sports car. She stroked her fingertips over his testicles as she gyrated her mouth around his penis. Jessica normally found that having the recipient of oral sex provide verbal direction was helpful, but clearly that wasn’t going to factor in here for obvious reasons. But her expertise made this somewhat unnecessary and the pace and fervor of Greg’s grunts and moans did make for a fairly handy road map in and of themselves.

She finally pulled herself upward and off of his cock. There was definitely a membrane of precum that had been emitted and she used it to wet her lips seductively as she reestablished eye contact. She then began to kiss his engorged member. She started by planting a soft kiss on his frenulum and working her way down. She’d normally start this way, not switch to it in the middle of fellatio. But she wanted to slow things down. Extend out his pleasure a little longer. Greg always tried to make himself last a long time, but tonight he was highly strung and being pushed toward climax at breakneck speed. She appreciated it as a high appraisal of her prowess. She worked her way back up his shaft and positioned herself mere inches above his eagerly waiting cock. She stared directly into his bright expectant eyes and went for a swim in their oasis. He was waiting patiently for her to continue. But she decided to test that patience, let it linger, tease it a little bit. She gave her eyebrows a couple lifts and let an implacable grin wash over her face as Greg stared longingly at her. She saw a mix of desire, expectation, and desperation swirl in his gaze. She was being a tease, but she fucking loved it. He thrust his hips upward as much as his current position would allow. Which was a substantial enough amount. She backed herself upwards and grinned coyly at him, content to let him work for it a little bit. She did want him to beg just a little. That was always music to her ears. She enjoyed exerting control. Having sole discretion over give and take, start and stop.

Greg: Mmmmmmppppphhhhhhhmmmmmm hhhhmmmmmmmppppppphhhhhhhh??

Jessica: Well…all right then.

She lowered herself back down over his throbbing penis and caressed it gently with her mouth. She let it know that it was no intrusion. She was making it feel like a welcome guest in the hospitable environment of her oral cavity. Greg moaned vigorously and started to take greedy, irregular breaths with his chest heaving. He was really giving himself into her now. She massaged her dexterous fingers into the muscles of his butt and she could feel a violent tremor ripple through his frame. Greg began to work his hips in rhythm with her own movements. Not content to have this act be just something that was being done TO him. His gyrations fell into rhythm with her own deft oral maneuvering. He began to moan with increasing rapture into the bit gag that she’d wedged into his mouth. The chorus of muffled pleasure grew louder and louder as his throbbing member began to pulse ever more fervently to announce the imminent arrival of an inbound orgasm. She made her movements more purposeful now. While keeping her gaze locked on his. She was locked deep in his lustful gaze. And she was sure that he was entranced in hers. The quaking of his penis were now at a fever pitch. He was due any second now.

With her eyes still locked on his, she timed a playful little wink right as she felt him losing control. And then he erupted. This was an impressive one. She felt the ejaculation of warm saline spunk spray around her oral cavity, painting the inside of her cheeks and throat. She let him pump the entire load into her mouth, never letting the smile in her eyes or on her widely parted lips falter. She didn’t want him to think that his emissions were brackish or unsavory. Therefore, she knew that she’d swallow it without issue. It certainly made clean up easier. And for some reason guys liked to think that there dick was a chef serving up avant-garde, luxurious fare. She didn’t really mind the taste. A little briny. When he was done and the rigidness of him member started to subside into a declining state of firmness, she extricated his cock from her mouth. She wet her lips and addressed her helpless husband.

Jessica: How was that, darling?

Greg: Mmmmmmmppppppphhhhhhhh hhhhhhhmmmmppphhhrrrmmmmm mmpphhhhhhmmmmmmmm!!!!!

Greg was nodding his head vigorously and showing enthusiastic approval and appreciation for her efforts.

Jessica: Excellent. Now let’s get you free. It’s almost midnight.

Jessica paused for a second as Greg beamed at her.

Jessica: But first. Let’s get something else free.

Jessica reached behind her back and unclasped her bra with some effort. She then slid the lacy black lingerie top off and let her firm, ample breasts mesmerize her husband. She leaned in and began to unbuckle the gag from behind his head. He let out a cute little grunt and then a sigh as the strap slid back through the buckle and she pulled the gag out of his mouth. He smacked his lips a few times and then licked them.

Greg: Thanks, babe. You’re the best.

Jessica: No. You’re the best. Thanks for another great year, honey.

She leaned in and planted a brief but passionate kiss on his lips. She then seductively rose up and made her way to his wrist restraints, purposefully bending over him so that her breasts were planted firmly on his face, his nose nestled between her cleavage. She could hear him purr with delight as she got to work untying his wrists. She could feel his tongue delicately tracing the underside of her tits and let out a small moan to let him know that this was something she would like him to keep up. Now it was her turn to auditorily communicate her pleasure. Eventually she picked the last of her vastly improved rope work and Greg was able to bring his hands down. He wrapped them around her and pulled her close. She quivered in his strong embrace, sliding her head down towards his shoulder and just collapsing there for a moment. Lying as one with him. Letting their breathing and heartbeats synchronize.

Eventually he relaxed his embrace and she moved off to untie one of his ankles from the bed. He moved to untie the other. They would make quick of her knots together.

Jessica: Do you want the big spoon or the little spoon this evening?

Part of their aftercare regimen involved cuddling. The person who was tied up always got to choose their position. Jessica much preferred being the little spoon. She knew this. Greg knew this. But sometimes if she’d been a little bit mean as his domme, he’d make her go big spoon. It did not appear that that was going to be the case today.

Greg: I’ll go big spoon.

Greg took a lengthy drink from a bottle of Aquafina that was sitting on their nightstand before he pulled himself into Jessica’s back, contouring her body with his own and letting his warmth radiate through her. They just laid there for several minutes. There was no reason to say anything. They were just two people enjoying a silence. The other’s presence was enough. Eventually though Jessica found herself wanting to check in with him on something. So she posed a question.

Jessica: Greg. Do you think we’re old?

Greg: Nonsense. Look at us. We’re like a couple of kids. Youth abounds within us.

The response seemed like a good-natured attempt to assuage her that she was still young and beautiful and hip rather than an attempt to really answer the question.

Jessica: I mean. Do you think that we should be doing things for New Years?

Greg: Such as…

Jessica: I don’t know. Going out. Being social. Travelling. Adventuring.

Greg: If that’s what you want.

Jessica: But what do you want? Spending New Years tied up can’t be your idea of a picnic.

Greg: It was significantly more enjoyable than you’re giving it credit for being.

Jessica: So you don’t miss the way we used to do New Years? Back when we were in our early 20s.

Greg: No. Your blowjobs have gotten much better. No teeth now.

Jessica gave him a playful smack.

Jessica: That was one time! And it was my second one ever!

Greg: I’m only teasing. You mean the travel. We can set something up for next year if you’re looking for a change of scenery. We’ve been talking about New Zealand. Maybe even let the girls tag along. I’m sure they can drag us out to some Auckland nightclub if you want to remember why being young isn’t all that great.

Jessica: Touche. But that sounds nice. It’s been a wonderful life. But the last few months have really reminded me how much I love adventure. New things. Thrills. And I really appreciate you coming along on this one with me over the last couple of months. It means a lot.

Greg: I wouldn’t have it any other way. It is the divine privilege of my life to be on this journey with you.

Jessica felt emotions well within her as she knew that he meant every word of it. She stroked his thigh as he nestled his chin into her shoulder and she just let the bliss of the night wash over her. Happy New Year, indeed.

[GreyLord]

What a great Happy New Year! @Fandango, you are very good at describing the feelings and emotions of your characters. Thank you.

[charliesmith]

That was a nice and fun chapter overall. Greg and Jessica are such sweethearts. I adore their relationship. I wonder where they will go from here.