Chapter 1: Taking Her Breath Away

1

Bound into the corset, she could take only shallow breaths, and bending was difficult. Her pussy was soaked and her ass was burning from the way his fingers had probed her as she laid out her underwear for his review. She wanted his fingers back inside her, she wanted to play with herself, but instead she stood quietly as she'd been ordered.

It had been humiliating to lay her intimates out for his perusal, dressed in nothing but this tight corset that left her breasts exposed and emphasized her hips and ass, feeling his fingers penetrate her front and back. Now she waited, watching him look over her plain cotton panties, her boy shorts and hip huggers, and her sexy underwear, deciding what she would be allowed to wear, and what she would have to discard. At least she had already already thrown out the shabby and stained panties that she wore on days when she hadn't had time to do laundry, so it could have been worse, but she felt anxious, watching his eyes and wondering if he liked he saw.

2

A week ago, he'd sat her down to talk about what it would take for her to become his slave. She felt the pull of the word; when he referred to "ownership" or "property" it instantly drew her to him and made her wet, but he had told her she wasn't ready for that.

She wondered why letting him restrain her and use her and kneel her down at will didn't already qualify as ownership, at least partially.

After a lazy breakfast, him in his long robe and she in the short lace-edged dressing gown that even when tied barely covered her, they sat together on the couch, his arm around her, her head on his shoulder.

"You want to be owned," he said.

"Yes," she said eagerly if not impatiently. "Owned by you. You're telling me I don't understand it yet, but I'm telling you it makes me melt."

"That means giving yourself to me," he said. "Quite literally. You surrender control, you surrender yourself. You do it consciously, you do it with intention, and you do it in a measured way, without ever turning back or reclaiming what you've given to me."

She nodded, the thought, and his tone of voice, making her very wet.

"I want to start with you surrendering control over one thing," he said. "I want you to get a feel for what it means to have no control over something."

She nodded eagerly, anticipating what he would say. Almost from the beginning, she'd been asking him permission before she came. She did it on her own their very first time and it soon became clear that it was expected. He also liked to know when she masturbated so she'd begun telling him each time. It was almost always about him lately.

A few weeks ago he'd gone on a business trip and at dinner the night after he returned, asked, "Did you not masturbate all week?" She said that she had, and he looked at her, and she said "I should have told you." And since then, that was a rule that she asked permission for an orgasm when she was with him, and told him about them when she was not.

The next step was obvious. She'd have to get permission from him before she came, whether she was with him or not. The idea of texting him with one hand as she played with herself with the other was making her wet. The main challenge would be holding off while she waited, but she was good at edging herself.

The project manager in her appreciated his formality and clarity, but she also liked people to get to the point. She was most of the way there already.

--

He looked at her, yet again loving the contrast between the edge of impatience in her voice and the nature of what she was impatient about, between the determined look in her eyes and the hardness of her nipples outlined clearly in the revealing clothing she wore for him.

He loved what a quick study she was. Sometimes he could see her visibly stop herself from finishing sentences; he'd mentioned it once and she'd said it was one of the most common feedback items from her employees and colleagues in 360 reviews. It could be amazing to have her apply that mind to being his property, but would she?

He knew she didn't understand what he meant. She certainly enjoyed the sexual aspects of submission, more than he had expected. At first he had wondered if Chloe had misjudged her, or whether she was, like Chloe, only interested in some kinds of submission. Sometimes she resisted his control until she had time to think -- a good sign -- but had so far accepted and seemed to enjoy everything he'd asked.

From the impatience he could sense now, he suspected that she didn't know what kind of control he meant, and he wasn't sure what her reaction would be. But clarity was good for both of them.

--

"I want to start with something simple, something you do every day," he said. "I would like you to surrender control of how you dress."

She sat back, visibly surprised. After a moment, she said, "But you already control that. I dress for you all the time. I wear the things you buy me. I'm wearing this because you told me wear it this morning. I dress like a slut for you."

"Yes, you do," he said. "And I can see how much you enjoy saying that, and doing it. But that is you choosing, at certain times, to wear things you know will please me."

She nodded, still not sure where this was going. Was this not obvious?

She flinched when his hand gripped her by the back of her neck, but she relaxed her muscles, giving him control, letting him turn her to face him. He looked directly into her eyes. "What I am saying is that you will have no choice, at any time, in what you wear."

She responded to his hand on her one way, but to his words, another. Her eyebrows went up.

"Every day, whether I'm going to see you or not, you will dress to my instructions and wear nothing I have not approved," he continued. "I'll always know what you're wearing, and you will not change clothes without permission."

She started to speak and he raised his hand to stop her. "Let me finish. I will choose your clothes, or you will select what you'd like to wear, and ask if I approve. When we are not together, you will message me or send me photos with enough time for me to review and respond. If you need to change during the day, you will again ask permission and describe what you want to wear."

This was extreme, more than she'd imagined. It was making her wet, but also a little apprehensive. "Every day?" she asked.

"Every day," he said. "This will be your first real taste of what 'property' means. Being my property means that you don't dress yourself. I do."

"So you'll pick my clothes out for me, or I'll wear what I choose if you approve it?" she asked.

"What if you can't answer when I ask you?"

"Then you can wear what you requested; I'll still know what it is," he said.

"So you either pick my clothes or you approve them, and I tell you everything I'm wearing."

"Yes," he said. "Or I may give you rules, or prohibitions, or requirements. For instance if I tell you that you are not allowed to wear a bra, you would then have to select clothing that would be appropriate for work. Or I may tell you to remove something during the day. I may tell you that you may not wear anything but skirts or dresses all week. I may have you go without underwear entirely."

"You're going to get creative with that like you do," she said.

"I'm going to do whatever I please, without consulting with you," he said. "I'm going to tell you how to dress, and you're going to obey. Do you understand?"

"I think so," she said. "What if it's cold and..."

His hand gripped the back of her neck again and she stopped, feeling a line of electricity going down her spine to her pussy.

"There are not what-ifs," he said slowly. "You obey, that's it. Do you understand?"

This was the moment, he thought, seeing the surprise in her eyes. Now she's understanding. He waited while her mind worked, wondering if he'd found her limit already.

But after a moment, she lowered her eyes. "I understand, Sir," she said. He breathed an internal sigh of relief, but as always, he wanted her to be clear.

"You understand what?" he said. She smiled; he didn't let her be vague any more than she let project specifications be vague.

He wasn't sure where the smile came from but was reassured by her words.

"I understand that you will tell me how to dress and I will obey," she said.

He could still hear some uncertainty; this was a lot, especially for someone like her. "And you trust that I will take care of you, because that's my job," he said in a softer voice. "You give me control of yourself, and I exercise that control with love and care. I'll never leave you out in the cold."

"Can I use a safeword for something like this?" she asked.

"You can use your safe word any time you need to, whether for pain or being overwhelmed or not understanding," he said. "Any time you need me to stop and hold you and talk to you."

His hand stroked her hair. She leaned into him, still feeling the effect of being told so bluntly that she would have to obey, period. He had seen the concern in her eyes, but he hadn't seen the jolt that hit her between the legs. Those words had snapped her to attention at a visceral level and she was still tingling at the echo of them.

3

A month or so ago, her friend Chloe had come over on a weeknight to chill without benefit of Netflix. They'd had a few glasses of wine on the couch, and Chloe asked how things were going with Robert. She wanted all the details, particularly since she had introduced them, and she was seeing a different side of her friend in this new relationship. She was older, she had a serious job, she took the lead naturally in so many areas -- and she was submitting to controls that Chloe wouldn't stand for.

"Do you have to call him 'Sir' or are you just doing that?" she asked. She'd never called Kevin "sir" in her life.

"It's not a strict rule," her friend said. "But he will sometimes wait after I say something, or he will make me repeat myself if I ask something too casually. And sometimes he raises his eyebrows at me and it just comes out naturally."

"I don't think I could do that with a straight face," Chloe said.

"I can't explain it, really," her friend said. "When I say it, I feel ... right. Correct. It feels good."

"It's hard to picture you talking like that," Chloe said. She had thought of her friend's submissive tendencies as similar to her own, but less extreme. It seemed they went in different directions entirely. Sexually or otherwise, Chloe

wasn't good at, or interested in, following instructions and rules. She just wanted to be treated roughly and fucked hard. Rachele was put off by the treatment Chloe liked, but Chloe would never sit still for these rules.

It worried her a little. Her friend had a history of enduring too much, and allowing men to blur the line between submissive sex and abuse.

--

The previous winter Chloe had been in a coffee shop in her friend's neighborhood. They'd made plans to meet and walk around an open studio event. But her friend was uncharacteristically late and in response to her ??? text, her friend responded, can u come here instead?

A bit irritated, Chloe walked over to her apartment and let herself in -- they had each other's keys. Her friend called from the living room, where she was lying on the couch in her bathrobe. She had been crying and when she sat up, Chloe saw she had a nasty bruise on her cheek.

"What the fuck, Rachele?? What happened?" she exclaimed, taking in the bowl of melting ice cubes on the coffee table and the washcloth in her friend's hand. "Did Daniel do this?"

"No, it was an accident," her friend said.

Chloe sat down next to her, and moved her friend's hair aside to see her face. It looked like she'd been hit, or hit herself, on the edge of something hard. It was swelling a bit but the ice was doing its job and the skin wasn't broken. Her friend buried her face in Chloe's chest and started crying. Chloe just held her, waiting to hear what had happened.

"I fell off the bed and hit my face on the nightstand," she sobbed after a few minutes.

"You 'fell off'?" Chloe said skeptically. "Where was he?"

Her friend shook her head and kept crying.

"Rachele! What happened? Please tell me," Chloe asked anxiously. This wasn't much better than "walking into a door."

Her friend sat up and wiped her face with the cloth, moving gingerly around the bruise. "He was spanking me," she said at last. "He does that sometimes and I like it. But I needed the bathroom and it hurt a lot and his hand was going inside my legs and hitting me in the wrong place."

Chloe said nothing, holding her friend's hand.

"So I sat up anyway, and he tried to pull me back, and I jerked away from him and fell right off the bed," she continued. "I was closer than I thought and the drawer was open and I hit myself on the edge of it."

Chloe reared up, but her friend shook her head. "He felt really bad, he wasn't trying to do it at all, and he got me the ice and everything. But I told him to go home. I think it scared him -- I've got like a dozen texts from him asking if I'm OK and if I need anything."

Chloe's face was hard now. "Did you answer him?"

"No," her friend said. "I don't know what to do. It wasn't his fault and honestly I do like it when he acts like that, when he pulls me back and doesn't let me go or doesn't let me up. But I really needed to pee. I almost wet myself when I fell."

"That's not OK, sweetie," Chloe said. "You know that."

"But it was an accident," he friend sobbed. "And Chloe, come on. How are your nipples?" The last time she'd been in bed with Chloe, there had been bruises on her nipples from clamps and small puncture wounds where Kevin had put needles through them. "That's OK, isn't it? You like it?"

"I love it," Chloe said. "But if I didn't, he'd stop. And we don't have 'accidents.'"

"So then..." her friend started, but Chloe interrupted.

"That's not what happened here!" she said, angrily. "You wanted him to stop and he didn't. I'm guessing he doesn't do 'safe words'?"

Her friend shook her head.

"That's really really not OK," she said. "I know you like that stuff. I do too, I like it a lot, I need it. But you can't be scared like that, baby. You can't. Not ever."

"It feels good to be scared," her friend said. "Sometimes."

"You can be scared like on a roller coaster," Chloe said. "That's good, it's thrilling. But this kind of scared is more like when you're in a car with a drunk driver. You're scared because you really could get hurt. You did get hurt. It could have been a lot worse."

"For what it's worth I think it scared him too," her friend said. "Maybe we can have a good talk about it."

Chloe looked skeptical. "Have you eaten anything?" Her friend shook her head. All that was on the table was a half-finished cup of coffee.

"Okay, I'm going to make you some breakfast," she said. "And I'll get you some fresh ice."

Within the week, her friend had "worked things out" with Daniel. Chloe had been unhappy and worried. She was glad a few months later when her friend ended the relationship after another out-of-control incident. But it left her somewhat concerned about what her friend was allowing.

--

"It sounds like a lot," Chloe said. "What has it been, two months?"

"Yes, but it feels right," her friend said. "I know what you're thinking. But he's calm, and he's never pushed me when I was scared. There's just this feeling of formality and expectations and structure that feels comforting and exciting at the same time."

"Expectations and structure?" Chloe asked.

"I never have to wonder what he wants, or if I'm doing things wrong" her friend said. "He doesn't get angry, but he corrects me, and he's patient if I don't get it right the first time. Like blowjobs. He likes them a specific way, so he's..." Her voice trailed off; she seemed a little embarrassed.

"He's what?" Chloe asked suspiciously.

"He's training me," her friend said tentatively. "He's showing me how to do it properly."

"'Training'?" Chloe said. "I've never heard you talk like this before."

"Nobody ever bothered before," her friend said. "I like knowing what he wants. I like that he's patient with me, and I love it when I do a good job."

"You like doing that?" Chloe said. She really loved going down on women but with guys it was just something she did.

"I've always liked it," her friend said. "But with him I crave it. I think about it all the time. I love being on my knees. I love everything about it. Including how much he enjoys it."

"Wow," said Chloe. "It's not a big thing for Kevin and me. Most of the time I'm doing it, I'm just waiting for him to yank me up by the hair or slap my face."

"He's not into it either?" her friend asked, somewhat surprised.

"Not really. He can't pound my mouth the way he can pound my cunt," Chloe said. "I just choke. And having a sore mouth isn't as nice as having a sore pussy. Not being able to walk normally is a nice reminder, but not being able to talk normally? Not so much."

"That's part of what I'm working on," he friend said. "Taking him as deep."

"I can't breathe," Chloe said.

"You can do it," her friend said. "If you relax your throat you can breathe around it. The problem for me is that he's long, so I start to gag. But I'm working on it and I'm doing better."

"Well then I guess you're getting serious." Chloe said. "He must be doing something right if you're working like that for him."

Her friend just smiled and nodded and hugged herself.

"But what about you? How much time do you get?" Chloe asked, putting her hand between her friend's jeans-clad legs.

"He enjoys me," her friend said. "He takes his time, he teases me, sometimes he just holds me open and does all sorts of things. He always wants me to taste myself and a lot of the time he kisses me or licks it off me. He likes how I taste."

"You are so delicious," Chloe said. "He damn well better appreciate you."

Her friend squeezed her legs around her hand. "He's not as good as you are," she said, pulling Chloe's face to hers for a kiss. That was the end of the conversation for a while. They never made it off the couch and soon her friend's jeans were on the floor and Chloe was the one on her knees, with her friend rocking her hips against her slowly, moaning softly.

Her friend pulled her head up and kissed her, enjoying her own taste. "Are you working tomorrow?" she asked.

"Not until the afternoon," Chloe said. She did freelance marketing and social media work so her schedule was loose.

Her friend stood up. "Will you come to bed with me?" she asked. "Stay the night?"

Unlike Chloe's, her schedule was not at all relaxed. She'd up and out by 7:30 the next morning as she was every day. But they had each other's keys and Chloe knew she'd be welcome to sleep in. She'd halfway wake up when her friend kissed her goodbye, and then use her very expensive coffee machine to make herself a latte and sit on the adorable bench under the window in the kitchen and have a nice morning.

Chloe stood up and took her hand. "I would love to." Her friend, still wearing her sweater but naked from the waist down, led her into the bedroom. Chloe reached out and put a hand on her ass as they walked, enjoying the solid feel of her, the CrossFit muscles she'd been building for years now.

--

It wasn't an evening of mad sex and panting orgasms, but instead, holding and kissing and touching and the slow relaxed enjoyment of each other with the unspoken knowledge that things would probably change soon.

Her friend had undressed her, unbuttoning Chloe's flannel shirt, kissing and licking her way down to her small breasts. Chloe almost never wore a bra and what she called her "skeeter bites" were, to her friend, small and perfect and exactly right for Chloe's lean boyish body. She loved her pointy nipples and the way she could take almost her whole breast into her mouth.