“I want to see how bad your bruises are,” he said quietly, and carefully tugged the waistband of my jeans down a few inches.
“Can you see them?”
“Yup. You’d feel a lot better if you soaked in a hot bath,” he said, releasing my waistband. “It would disperse the bruises more quickly as well. Do you have a tub?”
“Yeah, there’s a tub-shower combo. I’m not really a bath kind of guy, though.”
“You might want to learn to be.”
I rolled on my side to look at Austin. “What do you mean?”
“I mean,” he said matter-of-factly, “that if you do get back together with Mr. Dombruso, you’ll need to learn ways to recover from the things he’s going to do to you. And a hot bath is a good basic starting point.”
I stared at him for a long moment as he held my gaze steadily. And then I said, “Yeah, ok, I think I will go and soak. Which of course means you get to hang out in the bathroom with me.”
“Not a problem.”
I plugged the tub and started the water running, then stripped down to my boxer briefs. I couldn’t take my t-shirt off with the cuffs, so I asked, “Would you hold this for me?” And when he nodded, I pulled it off my free arm and my torso and rolled the shirt up onto his arm so it would stay out of the water.
And then I said embarrassedly, “Um, I need to pee.” Austin turned his back to me and stepped as far away as possible to give me the illusion of privacy, and I did what I had to do with one hand.
Then when I climbed into the water, Austin glanced at me and grinned. “You’re still wearing your underwear.”
“In retrospect, I suppose a bathing suit would have made more sense.”
He sat on the edge of the tub and said, “You know, you don’t have anything that I haven’t seen before.”
“We’re being forced to live in awfully close proximity here. I figure maintaining a sense of privacy will make this a little more comfortable for both of us.”
I spent several minutes examining the metal cuffs as I steeped in the hot water. They were really intricate, several narrower bands of metal interwoven into a wider cuff. I didn’t have a clue how they’d possibly open. Finally I gave up and leaned back in the tub, and said, “So, why don’t you go ahead and deliver your lecture? Get it over with. Tell me what a terrible person Dante is, and why I shouldn’t be with him.”
“Before that, I need to ask you one question. And please answer honestly.”
“Alright.”
He looked me in the eye as he asked, “Did you like it when Mr. Dombruso spanked you?”
I blushed deeply, but went with total honesty: “It was wonderful. I don’t think I’ve ever been that aroused. I not only absolutely enjoyed it, I felt like I needed it.”
A little half smile tugged at the corner of Austin’s full lips, and he said, “I was hoping you’d say that. Because if you’d actually hated every minute of it and were enduring it just for his sake, then I would have felt obligated to try to steer you away from him.”
“But now you don’t?”
“The thing is, I like Mr. Dombruso. He doesn’t think I do. A lot of clients, they treat me like trash, like I’m worthless. But he’s always treated me with respect. So I actually think he’s a good man.”
“Why does he think you hate him?”
Austin grinned and said, “That’s probably because I would spend the entire time he was whipping me cussing him out. That was another good thing about him, he really didn’t seem to mind being called every name in the book.”
“Really?”
“Well then again, he probably did mind. But he let me do it anyway. He knew that was my coping mechanism, and he let me do it because it helped me get through it.” Austin shifted on the rim of the tub, crossing his legs and taking my hand between both of his so he could rest it on his lap.
“Is it weird that I liked it when he spanked me?” I knew how ridiculously naïve that sounded, but I just had to know if I was somehow a total freak of nature.
“Not at all. See, with me, I’m not naturally submissive, and that’s why I hated it so much. Actually, I’m not even naturally a bottom. I just take those roles when my job requires it. But there’s nothing wrong with the fact that it gets you off. And it means that you and Mr. Dombruso are actually really sexually compatible.”
“Did, um…did he beat you every time?” These questions were super embarrassing, but there was so much I wanted to know.
“Without fail. Every session began with him tying me down. Next he whipped me or spanked me until he was aroused, and then he fucked me, hard. The only variations were how he chose to tie me down, and what implement he used to do the whipping. As you saw in the playroom, there was a lot to choose from.”