Modesty

"Mmmhh..." The moan starts out as arousal and trails off into frustration. "If I drop and kiss... here, now, in front of everyone... arrrrgghh..."

"Option Three, yes. In a nutshell."

"So, those are my options, Sir?"

"Yes -- Well, no. Technically, and since I'm feeling generous, Option Four is actually back to Square One. Back on the table: the blindfold. The way we started back in the bath, before you chickened out. Blindfold, yes, but no bondage. I'll command your body like a Master does his slave... but gently."

Kiss me twice, then once more,

That makes thrice,

Let's make it four

"Honestly, it's the simplest of your options. Definitely the most pleasurable... for you, I mean."

"I knoooww," you groan, burrowing your face into my chest. "Don't rub it in."

You nuzzle up to me, our hips swaying to the Gershwin standard, and I can tell you are weighing the four options. My hand has been dealt. And I think you take me seriously enough by now, you know you won't be getting any more chances.

"Well, Jamilah, which will it be?"

What a break, for heaven's sake

How long has this been going' on?

I mean to give you time to ponder your choices, Jamilah, I really do. But it's time you got started. Swinging you into another dip, I whisper it sibilantly into your ear,

"Which, Jamilah?"

Her.

The song ends to quiet applause. For the band, the singer? Why do I feel as though some of it is for Liam and me, our performance too?

The next song begins. Liam takes me in his arms and our slow-dance resumes. The lounge singer's voice slinks into my reverie,

I'm a little lamb who's lost in the wood

I know I could always be good

To one who'll watch over me

A lamb. That's what I am and you are the big bad wolf. You could devour me. I can see that much hunger in your eyes. I am aware you call me by my name. Jamilah. But I like it too when you call me concubine and slave.

Where does this leave me? Four options.

Surreptitiously, I glance around the room. It seems we still hold the attention of many of the patrons. For a fleeting moment I think, what the hell? How many of these people already think I'm a whore? What difference will it make if I drop to my knees in the middle of this empty dance floor? Seductively take my man's hips in my hands and and press my painted lips to the hard shaft straining against his trousers? They'd have stories to tell their coworkers and bridge partners when the got home from their sunny SoCal vacation.

And I would have a quick, easy way out.

If I do that, you say, I will be rewarded. If I submit to this public shame, Sir, and you will repay my obedience by filling my body with your masterful pleasures, my skin alive to every sensation, my belly enflamed and erupting. I know you can do that for me.

You spin me once, then back again.

Won't you tell him please to put on some speed

Follow my lead, oh how I need

Someone to watch over me...

That's what comes with Option Three. I won't be your slave, but I will let you conquer me just the same. It should be a simple choice. But it's not. It requires me to debase myself, on my knees, in front of hundreds of ogling, scandalized or lustful eyes. You have to know that's too far a bridge for me, Sir. Why have you made it so difficult?

But I have jumped ahead. How disorganized of me. I start again at Option One. Being his low-class whore.

This has the advantage of being private.... well, no, not the first part, come to think of it. Not if you honestly mean to put me on my knees in a dirty alleyway for an outdoor blowjob. But if if I can get through it, after that, it will be play out in privacy, the two of us in the suite.

Except, on the other hand, you have promised to make it rough on me, abusive, degrading.

Did you mean to say it like that's a bad thing? I smile to myself. What if this is what I really want? I'm dressed for it, after all, and with the way this satin teddy thong feels, cleaving my cheeks and hugging my loins... well, I'm already primed for some rough stuff.

But you know that. And that's why you made the choice tougher on me. You promised to "turn me out" once you finished spilling out your contempt all over me, "used-up," unsatisfied. Even worse, exiled to the other room, to sleep off my humiliation alone. You had to know that was going to be a non-starter. Now that I think of it, though, that was your way of telling me how you viewed my private-whore counter-offer: with contempt.

Where does this leave me? If not your two-dollar slut, then your bondage-slave... your Punishment-Toy. Option Two.

"A sound spanking," you said. "I mean, for starters." After that, I yield to your ropes and leathers and mouth-filling gags.. and after that, "yielding" loses all meaning, because then I'll be completely subdued. Your helpless little Punishment-Toy.

The problem with this is, I have to trust you with that power over me, Liam -- I mean, Master.

I should tell myself I do, but honestly, why should I? I've never tried anything remotely like that, and frankly, the scenes you've painted of it... they frighten me. Trust you? My God, I can't even get you to write a straight-up email letting me know when, where or whether we would ever meet! And you expect me to trust you?

I laugh into the shoulder of your suit jacket.

"What?"

"Nothing." I ignore your outward impatience, I think it's just a tease. I am sure you will give your slut all the time she need to choose between your four little hells. "I'm just happy."

And although I should move much faster

To make you my Master

To me heart, you carry the key...

Okay. Option Two, Punishment-Toy, I want to rule it out because it's just so uncertain. Which is scary --

... Still, the way you have said the Discipline Game will start is... well, almost romantic. We stand on two sides of a doorway, I am naked, you are clothed, and the first thing you demand of me is that I kneel.

... Yessss. On my knees, I am to display myself to please you. Spread them and push my breasts and pelvis out to you, like offerings. Next, dog-collared, leashed and made to follow your heel on all fours... No wait, I almost forgot! You've taught me to grovel as I crawl, face low, ass high....

Ooooh, slave likey! What's not to love about that?

Oh... then I remember.

... The next part is, I am led to your Discipline Place for punishment. Here, the ropes and leathers restrain and expose me, and I am helpless under your Discipline. And that's when I'll learn, unwarned, that "a sound spanking" is not going to be something administered with a firm but warm human hand. It will be with the cane.

... Next, I am to suffer punishments administered to the sole discretion of the Master's satisfaction, not to the limits of the slave's endurance. No mercy. My limbs immobilized and my protests strictly muted, I will be powerless to stop you.

-- Or at least that's how you've described it to me, Liam. Many times. I have no reason to think your stories exaggerate what you are capable of.

I'm a little lamb who's lost in the wood

I know I could, always be good

To one who'll watch over me

Funny, just now it occurs to me: If I make no choice at all, then Option Two, Discipline, is the default.

If I reject the blindfold, the cheap-whore treatment, and the spectacle of kneeling down to kiss your tented pants, and your Discipline -- I will have chosen nothing. What then? We walk off this dance floor and return to the suite. And there, having chosen nothing, I will have failed you. And for that, I must be punished.

Default Option: Discipline.

But the Discipline Game is not one I am prepared to play. I know it. Maybe you do too. The power you ask me to yield is absolute. You will have to test me first, Sir, work me up to that. I am not ready.

Option Three? Ewww! On my knees in front of everyone? No.

Back to Option Four/Square One: The blindfold. You promise me pleasures to go with it: I'll command your body like a Master does his slave... but gently.

Ominous. Suggestive. Enticing.

But in darkness.

No wonder you have made it sound so attractive. Clever Master! It was the first thing I refused, and now you are nudging me back toward it. The simplest choice, as you say. This is where you mean to steer me --

Only, if I choose it, I will be defeated. Back to Square One, I will have gained nothing, learned nothing, proved nothing. Brilliant, Sir, well played.

Next, my thoughts lingering over Option Four/Square One, it comes to me suddenly, even viscerally: I understand why I rejected the blindfold.

It's not you I need to see, it's me.

Looking back... over the course of our prolonged erotic cyber-flirting, one question always hung over the exchange: When we "finally met, in person," how I would humble, present and submit myself? I both thrilled and terrified myself wondering precisely how it might unfold.

But however it would be, I always knew one thing: I want my submission to feel like a melting-away of my shame, doubt, pride and fear, self-denial and modesty.

In that sense, it almost doesn't matter to me what happens next. What heights of ecstasy or depths of pain and degradation I reach. It doesn't matter what shape or face I wear when my true submissive nature blossoms.

All that matters is, I have to see myself submit. I have to witness it while my modesty is, once and for all, conquered.

Again, I glance around the room, thinking that we must be quite the spectacle. So many curious eyes are watching us, wondering why we are standing there, not speaking, only barely dancing...

... And I notice, there is no music.

"Jamilah, you have a decision to make. I wouldn't dream of rushing you. But we seem to be causing a bit of a sensation, dear."

I exhale sharply. It's clear to me now. There is no other choice.

**********

It is a blur.

Although it feels like excruciatingly slow motion, lasting an eternity, I am pretty sure in real-life I fall to my knees faster than the two-buck my Suckslut alter ego would drop after being offered a two-buck tip.

After that, though, I consciously push myself to slow down. Because I know it will please you -- in fact, it is your command, Sir -- if I take my time.

That's what I do. First, settling back on my haunches, the way a penitent slave does. Second, looking up at my conqueror like I'm admiring his strength. Third, starting at your knees, I slither my palms up the thighs of your trousers, settle them lovingly on your hips.

Then, rising up and leaning forward to kiss -- and just briefly, lick and suckle -- the rigid bulge of your hounds-tooth crotch.

-- Then I am back on my feet!

Grabbing your hand, I am grateful that you don't resist as I pull you off the dance floor. Eyes down, I lead the way through the lounge area, heedless of obstacle, moving at a quick jog.

If there are any faces or eyes in my sights as I scan the path before me, I have pixelated them out. You don't know any of them! Soon, every one of them will be behind you, gone! I am moving blind, thankful to feel your strong hand in mine.

Thank God, the elevator doors are just opening as we barrel towards them. It's a straight shot in. No company in the car.

Just me and my Master.

I can't help myself, I collapse into your arms, burying my face against your lapel, and I weep heaving sobs...

... but honestly, just two or three. Then I stop.

Then, I feel the excruciating tautness in body give itself up to giggles, then chuckles. Then to heaves of laughter, hilarious, unburdened.

You join in. Our laughter goes on all the way back down to the 10th floor.

Him.

There is a light rap on the adjoining door. When I open it, you are there naked, only your hair up, all your defenses down. You see what I have in my hand. I see what you've brought me in exchange.

For long moments, our eyes are locked. Then yours dip, and you sink to your knees.

You open up to me: Hands clasped behind your neck, chin up, lips parted, wet. Eyes dreamily half-closed. Subspace. Your breasts high and forward, knees spread wide, the bare blossom of your sex offered to me.

This is your submission.

I see your submission, and I raise you my collar.

You see my collar and raise your leash.

Transferred from your hand to your mouth, it dangles from your teeth, framed by two moist lips that very, very faintly smile.

I smile back. You have chosen this, Jamilah. I didn't instruct you. It would have been the same to me if you appeared in the slinky red thing, or just the teddy underneath, with or without the stilettos. I wouldn't have cared if you wore a bathrobe, ditched the ceremony and just sauntered in, offering me a peck on the cheek on your way by. How you entered was up to you. But this is what you chose.

This is how you choose to submit.

I display the leather in front of your eyes, which are liquid brown and sparkle with anticipation. It isn't for your approval or acquiescence that I do it, it's for your appreciation. You see that the burnished white, kid-leather sleeve that will encircle your throat. The one and only outward badge of your submission. Your collar.

The band of leather is broad. For a moment you wonder or worry if it will be uncomfortable, restrictive, or look ungainly on you. The next moment, I think you remember your neck is graceful and long. You know the supple leather will mold sumptuously to you, and with a proper lacing in back by my skilled fingers... you will look exquisite.

But I'm not ready to collar you yet. I have someplace else in mind for that to happen.

I hook my finger into the miniature D-ring in front and let the collar dangle as I turn away. My other hand drops to the level of your face and shows you the barest wave of beckoning. Sliding forward onto your hands, moving on all fours, gracefully you follow. Once you are completely inside, I shut the door between our suites, cutting your world into two halves.

You belong to mine.

Proceeding through the living room into the short hallway into the bedroom, we move through darkness lit only by sepia-gold candlelight. My nostrils catch a faint and fragile scent in your hair. Floral. Jasmine.

At heel, you follow closely. I look down and back and appreciate how your head is held high, proud in your submission. The curve of your ass etched in candlelight. The way your rich, wild raven hair is restrained. I like how your graceful movements lends a gently shifting symmetry to undulations of your back muscles. I like how the leash, unused, hangs from your teeth, dutifully waiting for the place and the time when I will put it to the task of controlling you.

We reach the threshold of the bedroom, and there we pause. Looking down at you, I am pleased that you have sensed you are meant to look back up at me. Your almond eyes, virtually black but glittering in the subdued lighting, seem to enlarge as they wordlessly ask, what now? How can I serve you?

Wordlessly. I think you recall the one instruction I did give you. I may have to remind myself, but I decided to apply it to me as well.

No words.

Her.

"No words."

Well, no, what exactly you said to me was, "In precisely twelve minutes, knock on the adjoining door." We were parting company in the hall outside our two rooms. "Present yourself any way you wish, Jamila. Don't be self-conscious, whatever you decide."

Then, what you said was, "I'll make one rule, and this applies to the both of us. No words."

I am delighted to obey. I cannot dream of a more breathtaking way to surrender to you. And I want the collar and the leash. You bring the one, I bring the other. Without words, I will take guidance from your leash. Without words, we'll speak with our hands and our eyes and the responses of our flesh. I have a name for this in the sacred part of my mind, and it is Heaven.

You are clothed. Suit trousers, dress shoes, fitted dress shirt with shirt-tails untucked. Light twill hounds-tooth grey, polished black wingtips, crisp, starched cotton and French cuffs folded up at your wrists.

I am completely naked.

I can think of no less "self-conscious" way to present myself to you than to offer you all I am, undisguised, unadorned. Nothing to hide and no place to hide it. I bare myself openly to you, clothed Master, naked slave. That erotic dialogue of power and powerless stokes the heat in my belly, moistens my offered pussy.

... And we've barely begun.

We are counterpoised this way on either side of a doorway, in two rooms. As you turn and beckon me, I slide forward palms on the carpet, and on all fours, gracefully I follow. Once I am across the threshold, you shut the door and my world is cut in two halves.

I belong to yours.

As I crawl at your heel, it so tempts me to do it in the groveling way you have described to me in such loving, shocking and arousing detail. Face low, ass high. I know I could do it, and do it pleasingly well --

... Like your trashy, trashed Suckslut, she would do it. But forced, degraded, threatened by the belt in her john's hand, which he has already used. Crawling toward the toilet, where she doesn't know what will happen, but knows it won't be good. Hoping, but uncertain, that enduring all the john's humiliating demands will net her a good tip...

... I can show you that, Sir. At least, I think I can.

... Like your Punishment-Toy, she would do it too. Dog-collared, in bondage she crawls on knees and elbows -- face low, ass high, enforced. Cringing at your booted heel while led to the Discipline Place. Imploring Master with her penitent, drooping posture, for mercy. And lowering her face to hide the tears she weeps, knowing she'll get none.

... I could show you that too, Sir. The groveling, even the tears. I am not ready for the rest. But I know you will bring me along.

-- So I don't even try. I hold my arms straight and firm, shoulders squared and chin high, like one displaying pride in her submission, because that is who I am and what I feel.

We approach the bedroom door. You pause and so do I. Sending that know you mean for me to look up into your face. When I do, the blueness of your eyes shine through the subdued lighting. They tell me, You are the most beautiful and desirable creature I have ever beheld.

My Fabio... But better. I don't need a Fabio. I need a Master.

Past the threshold, the door is shut. The damask curtains are drawn and the room is completely black. I feel you take hold of the leash in my mouth and gently tug, leading me in the darkness to the place you want me to be.

Once there, your hands guide my shoulders and limbs to assume the posture you want from me: kneeling back on my haunches, thighs spread somewhat modestly, hands resting on my thighs, palms up. Something tells me you want my head bowed... but with a careful hand, you correct me, lifting my chin.

Behind me, a soft light springs to life. After a moment, you move beside me and place a wide, cylindrical candle on the carpet in front of me, and a few feet to the other side, a second. In the profound darkness of the room, the candlelight is as bright as two huge, ochre harvest moons.