More than a Dare (Masters Club 4)

The welt from earlier that morning had already faded to the palest pink. He looked forward to adding many more marks before the day was over. And he needed to introduce her to suspension bondage, and maybe some breath play.

So many wonderful possibilities—so little time.

Things were going better than he’d dreamed possible, despite her brief lapse in judgment earlier that morning. It had only been three weeks since the night of the Masters Club party. It was hard to believe how far she’d come in such a short time.

If things continued to go as well as they had been, she might even be ready to sign a genuine Master/slave contract by the end of the weekend!

He thought back to their flirtations when she’d first gotten wind of his secret life, and how eager she’d been to step into his world. He’d warned her then she was biting off more than she could chew. But had he been wrong? In the space of only a few months, they’d moved from flirtatious colleagues to genuine friends to lovers and now…to Master and slave?

Hayden had always assumed he’d eventually find his submissive soulmate at the Masters Club. Even while he’d consciously avoided getting too close to any one woman there, in his heart of hearts, he’d believed when he met her, he would just know.

When he’d first laid eyes on Dahlia, he’d been instantly attracted, but had discounted that attraction, keeping to his own prime directive of never falling for a vanilla girl. Because, after all, what was the point of that? No matter how sympatico they might be, when things moved to the bedroom, it would all fall apart. He’d learned that the hard way.

But Dahlia had caught him by surprise. She was so sharp—clever and funny without being pompous or self-absorbed, as so many surgeons were—male and female alike. She was generous with her time, dedicated to her patients and always treated her nurses and the other staff with kindness and respect.

He’d known he was skirting the edges of his own rules of engagement when he’d started meeting her for those breakfasts before rounds. He’d told himself he was mentoring the new kid on the block—teaching her the ropes of the hospital and advising who to befriend and who to avoid. He’d been surprised by how quickly she’d caught on. Soon, it was she giving him advice and counsel, especially when it came to complex medical cases. He’d always found strong, intelligent women a huge turn-on, and she was no exception.

Yet it had been disconcerting, even frightening, to realize he was falling for a vanilla girl. Though she was BDSM-curious, he naturally assumed she didn’t have a real clue about what it meant to embrace the lifestyle.

Yet, Dahlia had proved his fears to be unfounded. Every step of the way, she’d met each challenge with courage and grace. He supposed he shouldn’t have been so surprised she’d embraced this D/s experience with her whole self. It was how she approached her career and her life—giving it her all.

Underneath that vanilla façade had slept a genuine submissive. And he’d been the Prince Charming—or was that Master Charming—to kiss her awake.

Okay, cut it the fuck out.

This wasn’t a fairy tale, and he was no prince. While things were going better than he could have imagined, was he really ready to claim one woman as his slave? He took the responsibility of becoming someone’s Master very seriously indeed. That kind of relationship was as binding as a marriage, if not more so. Was he up to that challenge?

And how would that work when it came to the Masters Club? Jack and his slave, Cleo, primarily scened with each other, but Jack didn’t mind lending Cleo out from time to time. Nor did he hesitate to use the club’s pleasure subs when the mood took him.

How would Dahlia feel about that kind of arrangement? How would he feel?

Since Cameron and Jess had gotten together, they still scened regularly at the club, but rarely played with others. Before Jess, Cameron had once been much like Hayden—enjoying his status as Head Master and choosing a new girl each night.

When he’d gotten serious about Jess and pulled her from the pleasure sub roster, Hayden had shrugged, bemused at the one-eighty the guy had pulled. With so many lovely, willing and obedient pleasure subs to choose from, why bind yourself to just one? Hayden had smugly congratulated himself at the time on having avoided the love trap.

But now he got it. Love wasn’t a trap. It was a door into a whole new way of being. He’d never felt so alive, so vital and happy, so hungry for her touch, her smile, her kiss. Dahlia was all he wanted, all he thought about.

Careful.

He was moving too fast. She was still very new to the whole scene. She was still feeling her way. And so was he, if he were honest. He had entered emotional waters he’d never tread before, and he was in deep.