Power Trip(13)
She almost choked on her drink, as her thoughts spiraled into the gutter. His eyes were on her, which made it difficult to conceal the turn her thoughts had taken, but if the intense look on his face was anything to go by, she didn’t have to. He was right there in the gutter with her.
“Are you ready to begin?” he asked, with a gleam in his eyes.
She nodded slowly.
His grin was a quick flash of white teeth, while the lights brightened around them. “My dungeon is in the basement.”
Chapter Five
Cal led her down the stairs, sending enough energy into the floor to light the room ahead of them, hoping it wouldn’t look completely perverted and deviant to her, but it was a dungeon, so he didn’t expect to have much luck. He didn’t cater to vanilla down here. He didn’t even cater to middle of the road kinky. He served his needs with experienced submissive women who loved electrical play and would allow him to restrict their sight, hearing and movement. He didn’t want to have to explain sparks and flashes or the occasional boom of thunder. An accidental touch could cause injury, so the leather table in the center of the space was rigged with full-body restraints, not just ankle and wrist manacles. His table could immobilize Frankenstein’s monster. It had straps every four inches that adjusted for every body type. One willing sub had clapped her hands at the sight of his table, but he was afraid Audrey was going to say something more along the lines of—
“Holy shit.”
He grabbed her hand, fearing she would turn tail and flee back up the stairs. She allowed him to draw her forward, but her eyes never left the table. He feared her response wasn’t going to get any more positive when she started looking around.
He hadn’t been kidding about the geek stuff in the car. Most of his co-workers at the university shunned him, thinking he was more than a little odd. He encouraged that. He didn’t want anyone getting too close and asking about his gloves. The new insulating material he had designed was nearly invisible, but still. He wore thick glasses, treated with anti-glare to hide the occasional glow of his too-blue eyes. He called in sick when it rained. He knew they thought he was a freak, but he didn’t care. He was used to that.
His friends at the Lair thought he was a freak too. They just thought he was their kind of freak. They assumed his bright eyes were contacts, his leather stemmed from a love of hardcore kink, and any stray sparks or shock were attributed to too much time with the violet wand.
Upstairs, his house was filled with the normal minutiae of daily living, once you got past the fact that it was powered by him. But his enormous basement held his real life, half-dungeon, half-research lab, separated by a wall and a locked door. The dungeon was his playground and the lab was where he did the research he couldn’t afford to be caught doing at work. Naturally, Audrey’s eyes were drawn to the door separating the rooms.
“Good God, what’s on the other side of the wall?” she asked.
“My private lab.”
Her eyes lit up. “Can I see it?”
“Only if you are a very good girl.”
She bit her lip, eyes skating over the whips and canes displayed on one wall. Her gaze stopped on the hoods, modeled on wire heads above the couch.
Cal chuckled. “How on earth is it that Jake Fallon’s sister looks like she’s never seen a dungeon before? Your brother never showed you—”
“Eww, no! Jake did his thing and I did mine, and since he was always in trouble, I sort of went the other way, hoping if I was good enough, our foster parents would put up with his crap.”
“Ah, I know how that is. I was raised by my aunt, so I had to behave too.” He drew her forward, toward the black leather beneath the shelf of hoods. He was walking on uncertain ground with her. His previous sexual partners had all been pain sluts into electrical play and extreme restraints. Audrey was an admitted vanilla and the kid sister of a guy who could kick his ass…and shred his mind. Jake could suggest he spend the rest of his life cleaning toilets with a toothbrush and that would be that. Speaking of which. “Text your brother.”
“What?”
“Text your safe call. I want a full hour once we begin.”
She pulled her phone out of her purse and touched the screen. When she was finished, she held up the screen. I’m safe in Bluebeard’s cave. She pointed at the hoods on the shelf and grinned.
“Very funny.” He patted the couch next to him. “I’ll let you decide whether you want to be blindfolded, but I’ll have to insist on the table restraints and the monitors. Safety first. I don’t want to hurt you accidentally.”