Tethered

Chapter One-2

"You have the wrong man," he said.

"No. I don't.” She shook her head, shaking him to the core with her veracity. She knew something about his past, but how?

"Franny, I don't know where you got the idea that I tie women up, that I'm dominant—though I won't deny I'm sometimes a scoundrel—but you've got your information wrong."

"Have I now?" she replied. "How about Robert Cheswick, Adrianne Marker, Penny Holcomb . . . should I go on?"

"How do you know them?" he grilled her, as he recalled people from his past, the club, the dark place where he'd let his darkside passions have their way for nearly six incredible years. But that was nearly ten years ago.

"Penny was my sister's friend. Told me all about you, Jack, like you were the only real dominant man she ever met. The only one that really "had the knack". She said you did ropes better than any of them."

"I don't play those games anymore," Jack said, becoming a little more relieved that this was just a case of flagrant imagination fueled by Penny Holcomb's narrative—which knowing Penny was all too detailed. "I left that scene, eight, nine years ago."

"But you can't deny it's still there, Jack."

"You're being presumptuous again."

"What's that?"

"I told you this morning, you should listen.” The irritation was rapidly building.

"I don't remember," she quipped.

"Oh, yes you do. You're sly as a fox, Miss Franny, whoever you are."

"You mean to tell me you're not the least bit intrigued by the thought of tying me up?"

Jack Brando could readily think of a thousand things he could do to a fresh, though obviously not so innocent, woman as Franny. But there was a vow he planned to keep.

"Intrigue doesn't die, you're right about that, but if you think you're going to woo me back into the scene, you're wrong."

"Oh, I don't want to woo you back into "the scene.” I'm not really into stuff like that. I just have this great desire to be tethered . . . my limbs bound, my body immobile stretched tight . . . " He could see her mind imagining the moment as she spoke, just as he was himself. " . . . your fiendish eyes diving into my soul. I can see it, Jack, as easily as I see myself in a mirror."

"I think you've read too many books, you've let a good erotic yarn go to your head. Reality and fantasy are rarely one in the same."

"I know that," she insisted. "And I know what I want from you."

"To dominate you or anyone, I don't work in a vacuum. There would have to be just cause and motivation and chemistry. I'm not a dominant for hire that will play any role as long it suits the submissive. Believe me, it's dull that way. One of the reasons I lost interest."

"Of course, you lost your inspiration, so I'll be that for you again."

"No, Franny. Not owing you an explanation at all, I'll tell you this, my relationships with women don't need it anymore. I'm not interested.” He'd used these lines as passionately a few years back when there were other women wanting to entice him back into the wild game playing. It seemed an easy enough thing to say to the young woman sitting before him, but he was faltering badly in his convictions, and he wasn't sure why. His imagination was filled with pictures of her in bound repose, of her squirming body, of her enforced submission. The little tart was ripe for taming, there was no doubt about it; but he didn't like the fact that she knew it and had settled on him.

Jack pulled the rope from her and placed it on the kitchen drainboard.

"If I were to do anything, it would be on my terms. Submissives don't dictate, they submit."

"So you are interested," she said, thinking she'd discovered the goldmine she was looking for. Her face was ecstatic.

"I didn't say that," Jack said. "Don't jump to conclusions. Besides, you have the wrong attitude for a good submissive."

"I do?"

He laughed. "You have no idea what you're doing, do you?"

"I can learn," she turned coy, the smile seductive, the eyes turning smoky, the little actress in her trying to create another mood. She was about to pounce on him like a cat luring him with moves that dripped eroticism.

"Submissives don't try to manipulate, Franny. That's particularly annoying to any dom."

"But you're responding.”

"Go home. I'll let you have the job for a few days; but if you want it, you need to be here at seven o'clock tomorrow morning."

"Seven!"

"Oh? Haven't you spied on my early morning commuter traffic too?" he asked.

"I don't get up that early," she said, flatly. It was probably the first thing that had surprised her all day long.

"You want to quit?" he asked. "Fine with me."

"No," she answered adamantly. "I'll be here."

"Then be here quarter to seven, or you can forget working for me and anything else you were planning.”

"Quarter to seven!"

"Quarter to seven," he repeated.

Despite the arrangement made for morning, Franny wasn't budging from her seat. She'd planned on staying the night but it wasn't happening. Jack stared, she stared back. Reality was dawning on her, different from the rich fantasies that had her imagination enthralled. He was not an easy pushover like other men. It would be horrible if he was; but to her amazement, Jack Brando had her baffled.

"Time to go, Franny," he said. For an instant he was being gentle as a nurturing parent, the eyes taking her in just the way she'd seen him do with the people at the bar.

"Who was that woman who was in here this morning?" she asked, completely ignoring his request.

Out of context, the question startled him. "You mean Venita?"

"The blonde, who has 40's tramp written all over her?"

"Like you have 1990's tramp written all over you?"

"Yeah.

"She's my girlfriend."

"Ooo, that's going to be a problem when I move in.” She looked worried.

"Move in, who said that was going to happen?"

"It's gonna happen, just like hiring me, and letting me suck your c**k and tying me to the bedpost.” She was all perked up remembering the fantasies that had moved her to make the assault on Jack Brando in the first place. That restored, the sass and verve returned as well.

"I think you've overstepped your bounds, Miss Franny. Better leave now."

"I could just spend the night," she suggested, "seeing as how close it is until dawn."

"That would be too easy for you, wouldn't it?" he said. "No. You sleep in your own bed," he answered her.

He watched her sit in his kitchen chair, seeing her skirt hiked so high on her thighs he could just barely see a naked snatch of p***y peeking out. When she stood, the short skirt hardly dropped at all. Jack had a feeling, even as she was getting ready to leave, that her brain was still consulting with inspiration for a way to get out of the early morning call; unfortunately, she had no power to change the rules, something she was probably not used to.

She swished her ass all the way down the stairs, and turned back at the bottom to gaze up at him. Blowing him a kiss, just as Venita had that morning, she disappeared into the coffee house. When he heard the door click shut, he thought he was safe; but remembering how she eluded him before, he went downstairs to make sure she wasn't lurking in the dark.

The door was latched and the lights were out, he could sense that she'd really left this time. And when he turned toward the window and looked out on the street, there she was, standing outside looking at him, as if she'd been waiting for him to appear at the window. Just a satisfied smirk this time, and she strolled down the street.

The next day Franny showed up at a quarter to seven, looking deliberately more demure than she'd been the day before. Not that her hair had changed, or the wildly changing expressions on her face were any less varied, or the breezy attitude of confidence didn't play out in every move she made; but her skirt was less revealing, her sweater less showy and she looked more like the kind of women he'd prefer working for him in the coffee house. It pleased him that she'd accommodated him that much, after the strange stares he got the previous day from faithful regulars at the coffee bar.

Jack hadn't planned on anything but a casual working association with Franny; but by the time the day ended, she had climbed so far under his skin that all his thoughts involved taking control of her just as he had women in the past, and doing with her the vivid s****l things that lay in the subterranean territory of their fantasy. To ignore the desire was dangerous, to give in to it was another matter. Ten years without the other life, he'd been content, though he was not so content, watching Franny work, knowing what was on her mind.

Still there would be no rash initiations, no hasty decisions; only time would suggest if she would even suit him as a s****l companion, and if so, when she would be screaming mad enough to be taken into the dark beyond.

"You finished with me?" he heard her ask, as he was pouring over account books at a table in the corner.

"You finished the cups?"

"I'll finish them in the morning," she said.

"Finish them now, please," he said, and went back to the accounting.

"No," she replied. He listened to her voice.

There was definitely defiance there, but no manipulation. It was a sign of her inherent laziness, not thoughts of a s****l consequence. She wasn't a cracker jack waitress, just simply adequate.

He looked up at her.

"Giving up so soon?" he asked.

"No, I'm just tired."

"Then go home. Be early in the morning."

"Is that necessary?" she asked.

"You seeing how far you can go with me?" he asked.

Odd, he missed her joyful insouciance. The mood of annoyance didn't suit her.

"Is this a real job, Jack Brando?" she asked.

"What do you mean real?"

"I keep feeling like I'm on probation or something."

"You needed to prove yourself, yes," he said.

"And I haven't?"

"That'll take time," he said. "Be patient with me and yourself, Franny. You still have the job.” He was tired too, and didn't feel much like talking.

"What about other things?" she asked.

"Do you want a job, or do you want s*x?" he asked pointedly.

"I need the job.” There was no equivocation about that.

"And the s*x?" he asked.

"I want the s*x," she said simply.

"Maybe you can't have both," he said, and he returned his attention to the papers on the table.

"Oh," she replied quietly, and she turned to walk out.

"But then, Franny," he called her back, "maybe you can have both, we'll see."

It was the first hopeful comment he'd made, but it was hardly enough to make her heart soar.

She would have to think of something, a better way to woo. That thought engaged her mind enough so that she was busily preoccupied all the way home.

"Who's that little tart you hired?" Venita asked, while her hands were running along Jack's thighs and over his groin, her lips doing a seductive dance around his rising c**k.

"Franny," he said. "Gave me a blowjob the first night, and I couldn't let her go," he replied.

"Is that how you usually hire your waitresses, see how good they are at getting you off?"

"She offered, in fact, she practically had me captured on the stairs."

"She captured you? Humph. She wants something," Venita concluded.

"Of course. Jack Brando's dungeon."

"Ooo my, darling, that's been a long time.” Her lips went down on his c**k again.

"Not long enough," he said as he was fast losing interest in the conversation about Franny.

"Are you sure?" Venita said, looking up at him with a much too serious look on her face.

"I swore off."

"She's a lot like Lacy," Venita remarked.

"Lacy?” He hadn't thought of the woman in years.

"Yes, that's what I was going to tell you. Haven't you seen it in her face."

"Lacy was crazy."

"Maybe this girl is too, haven't you thought of that?"