Red Handed(13)

Cassandra tossed her hair over her shoulder as she sashayed across the room and out the door. “One day I’m going to make you sorry. You can count on it.”

“You can try.” Gracie slammed the door, then rested her back against it. “Don’t let her scare you. She thinks she’s a lioness, but she’s really a declawed alley cat. Lots of noise but totally harmless.”

Danielle hoped her path wouldn’t cross much with Cassandra’s during her stay. She had enough to worry about. “I have to be honest. A lot of what you were talking about went over my head. It’s like listening to a foreign language.”

“I’ll try and explain it in vanilla terms.” Gracie pushed off the door and resumed her spot on the bed next to Danielle. “Last night, Master assigned Cassandra to help one of the members with his demonstration. Shibari is a form of bondage, and one of its multitude of perks is the unique placement of the knots.” She emphasized the word “unique,” but Danielle still had no clue what it meant. “Master requested that Sir Logan leave Cassandra unsatisfied.”

It may have been petty, but hearing it made Danielle smile. “Why would he do that?”

“Who knows?” Gracie shrugged. “Master always has his reasons. My guess is she needed a reminder we slaves are here to serve our Master. We’re like nuns, only we wear less clothes and get to have sex.” She skipped to the dresser and lifted a silver wristband with a key attached to it. “This is your trainee bracelet and your room key. Wear it at all times.” She slipped it over Danielle’s wrist. “It lets the patrons know to keep their hands off unless Master says otherwise. Your training classes begin at nine every morning, Monday through Friday, and the club opens nightly at eight.”

“Classes?” Danielle swallowed hard, the subtle weight of the band around her wrist making everything more real. She was really going to train as a sex slave.

“First thing you’ve got to learn is safety. No one goes on the floor without that first class.” Gracie’s voice went from playful to serious before Danielle could blink. “You’d be surprised how much there is to learn about what makes up the requirements of ‘Safe, Sane, Consensual.’ You’ll get enough tomorrow morning to enter the club tomorrow night, but the class runs through your three-month-long training program. Then you’ll get classes on protocol, technique, and of course the labs, which are where you get to try out everything.”

Danielle reached behind her, grabbing the items she’d acquired from Cole. “I’m supposed to redo my questionnaire, and to be honest, I don’t know how I feel about some of these things.” She motioned to the form. “There’s a few obvious ones I know I won’t try, but others . . . ”

Gracie plucked the form from her hand. “The ones you refuse to do are your hard limits, and the ones you’re not sure of are your soft limits. For example, fire play and anything to do with bodily fluids are a couple of my hard limits. Needles have always terrified me, but not enough to keep them off my list, so when I first got into the lifestyle, I checked them as a soft limit. Now needle play is a favorite of mine.”

She winced at the idea. “Needle” and “play” were two words she never thought would go together. Definitely a hard limit. Perusing the rest of the questionnaire, she stopped on some of the more confusing items. She couldn’t help lowering her voice to a whisper. “What about . . . same sex? How do I know?”

Gracie curled her hand around the back of Danielle’s nape. “Only one way to find out.” She leaned in and pressed her soft lips against Danielle’s, giving her a moment to process before intensifying the kiss. Danielle found herself responding, parting her lips and sighing into Gracie’s open mouth. She tasted like banana. And chocolate. Milk chocolate if she wasn’t mistaken. Danielle wondered where she could find some more of that chocolate in this place, because the apple had done nothing to diminish her appetite.

Gracie abruptly ended the kiss. “Anything?”

No racing heart. No throb between her thighs. No desire to do it again. Kissing a woman hadn’t nauseated her, but it did nothing for her other than make her crave a candy bar. “Not really. I mean, it’s not that you’re not attractive—”

“If your Master wanted you to do it, would you?” Still smiling, Gracie didn’t seem to take offense. “I can’t tell you how to answer, but it’s something to think about as you complete your questionnaire. Remember, it’s our role to serve our Master, but not at our own expense. It’s like a mirror. Our happiness reflects on him, and his on us.”