“It can also be very powerful, in a good way,” Eric said, watching her closely. In his experience, a sub was often most attracted to the very thing she feared most. Beneath her trepidation, he sensed excitement, even desire.
“You’re bound, helpless, at the mercy of another,” he said, painting a picture for her. “You can’t move, you can’t resist. As you’re lowered into the water, he holds your very life in his hands. But if you trust that person—I mean, really trust them with your heart, soul and full submission—it’s no longer frightening. It can be a very empowering, satisfying experience for both parties.”
Her eyes had widened as he spoke, the pupils dilating. “Gosh,” she whispered.
Perhaps, as they got deeper into her training, he would do a water play session.
Leaving it for the moment, Eric changed tacks. “I’d like to get a clearer understanding of your background. When did you first know you had submissive, masochistic feelings? How old were you?”
Rowan tilted her head, gazing upward as she pondered. “Let’s see. I guess from the time I was sexually aware—maybe fourteen or so? That’s when I discovered masturbation,” she added with a small, embarrassed laugh. “My sexual fantasies have always revolved around a strong alpha male taking control. Before I had any actual experience, it was mostly about bondage—being tied spread-eagle to the bed and ravished from head to toe, that sort of thing. Later, when I started reading stuff online about it, I found the concept of erotic pain both frightening and exciting. I had a serious boyfriend senior year of high school. I convinced him to give me a spanking, just to see what it was like.”
“And?” Eric queried.
Rowan’s face suffused with pleasure. “It was awesome,” she breathed. “I mean,” she added quickly, “it hurt. No question about it. But it was a good hurt—a necessary pain, if that makes any sense. I got so turned on that I jumped the poor guy’s bones. I had always been kind of shy before that, and he’d been the one to coax me along. But that night, I couldn’t get enough.”
Eric grinned. “A true masochist, then. I bet he was pretty happy with the arrangement.”
She shrugged. “You’d think. But it was actually the beginning of the end for us. He hadn’t expected my strong reaction. He’d just seen it as a little kinky foreplay—a onetime experiment. When I kept asking for more and harder spankings, he said he wasn’t comfortable hurting a girl. I tried to explain it wasn’t hurting me—it was what I needed, but he didn’t get it. When I suggested we try bondage and maybe even forced sex—pretend of course—he totally freaked out. He told me there was something wrong with me. He wanted to major in psychology, and he told me I might need professional help to resolve my abandonment issues and need for daddy’s approval through corporal punishment.” She chuckled bitterly. “He said I was a freak.”
“That had to be hard,” Eric said, offering a sympathetic smile. “People who don’t get it just don’t get it. He was wrong. You know that, right?”
Rowan nodded. “I do now. But back then I was devastated. I really loved the guy. I had trusted him with my deepest secrets and he said I was a freak. He not only dumped me, he shared it with his buddies—what a perv I was, and all the sick shit I had wanted him to do. It was a small high school in a small town, and pretty soon everyone knew. It was incredibly humiliating. I became a pariah. Girls I’d thought were my friends excluded me at lunch and tittered behind their hands when I walked by.”
“High school sucks,” Eric said. “For the most part, they’re still just a bunch of snot-nosed kids parading around in adult bodies. At least most adults have learned to behave with some degree of politeness and acceptance of others’ differences—except on social media,” he added with a wry grin. “There they’re free to be as hateful, bigoted and willfully ignorant as they want.”
Rowan snorted. “You can say that again. That’s one thing I don’t miss since Master John took away my phone rights.”
“Wait, what?” Eric frowned.
Rowan colored. “Oh, um. It’s for my own good, of course. He says it’s an unnecessary distraction. A true slave exists solely to please and serve her Master. Outside contact, at least at this point in my training, is an insult to him because it implies I’m seeking others when all I should need is him. He says I’ll have all the company I need once he brings another girl home.”
“And this is okay with you?” Eric blurted, some of his composure slipping.
She frowned. “What do you mean?” Then her expression closed, her eyes sliding from his as her hand went up to her slave collar. “It’s not for me to say if it’s okay or not okay. I am Master John’s property, not the other way around. He knows what’s best for me, even if I can’t always see it. Everything he does, he does for my own good.”