Breathless (The Game 3)

I did have fights tomorrow to look forward to, but it wasn’t the same. If anything, the pain I received in the cages was amusing.

Continuing up to the third floor, I unwrapped a lollipop and trapped it in my cheek. The last White Rose party had been awesome. It’d been hosted across the river in Virginia, where you were still permitted to smoke in some public areas, which included that club’s rooftop terrace where I’d also received the mother of whipping sessions.

Just whipping never pushed me to where I wanted to be; the physical pain alone aroused me. But combined with extreme degradation and the knowledge that I didn’t matter enough to be given aftercare afterward, I’d ended up feeling pathetic and worthless. Like I deserved. And once that button was pushed, all pain became unbearable to me.

Isela was easy enough to spot. She had ridiculously long hair, reaching below her ass, and she’d told me she’d be carrying a purse with the Little Nation flag. The only flag missing was El Salvador’s, which she used as a filter for her profile picture online.

Her gaze landed on me when I was a few feet away, and she grinned curiously. “Shay?”

I inclined my head and extended a hand. “Nice to meet you in person.”

“You too!” She shook my hand firmly as a new song came on, one with a grinding, seductive beat. “I’ve seen many amazing Sadists here tonight. I’m sure we’ll both get some playtime.”

I hoped she was right. Talking to her online this week had been somewhat of a revelation. She’d approached me in a thread about bullwhips, responding to something I’d commented with, “If only it didn’t take a year of commitment to a Sadist before you actually got a taste of a bullwhip,” which I’d found funny. And true. Then she’d DM’d me and made it clear I’d been delusional to ever think I was a social person. She struck up random conversations with just about anyone in the public threads, and she talked. A lot. About everything.

“Cute with the lollipop.” She smirked and flicked the end of the stick.

I snorted quietly and shifted it to my other cheek, then surveyed the club area. Blue and white strobe lights traveled across the crowd and turned everyone into static. People were still arriving, and singles moved in groups rather than couples.

I wanted to check out the seating areas across the floor.

I kinda wanted to sit down too. I’d taken a nap after returning to the apartment earlier, only to wake up with a headache from hell. My skin felt sensitive, and I couldn’t quite shake the tiredness.

Leaning closer to Isela, I asked if I could buy her a drink. It was the least I could do for her weirdly passionate quest to find me a Sadist.

Her dark eyes lit up. “A frozen margarita, please? Strawberry, if they have it.”

“You got it.”

A few minutes later, she was holding a big frozen strawberry margarita in her hands, and we left the bar to see if there was anyone she knew at the tables. I assumed there would be, not only because she’d said so, but because she constantly waved at people who recognized her.

“Oh, Shay, you gotta try this one. It’s delicious!” She held up the drink for me.

I smirked a little and removed my lollipop, then took a quick pull from her straw.

It was better than beer, at least. The cold felt good in my throat.

“Not your poison?” Isela guessed.

“It was all right.” I stuck the lollipop back into my mouth and nodded toward the seating areas. “Point out someone I should talk to.”

Fuck. It took me two seconds to lay eyes on the Tenley twins. What the hell were they doing here? They sat alone at a table, and they were watching a man nearby who appeared to be arguing with his partner.

I kinda wished River and Reese weren’t so goddamn attractive. They put James Dean to shame, and it wasn’t the only category I could put them into. I wasn’t sure if they had the bodies of linebackers or two blue-collar men who’d had physical jobs all their lives, maybe somewhere in between. They were tall, immense, solid, without looking like they were trying too hard. Or trying at all. They didn’t strike me as guys who went to a gym regularly anyway. Rugged, inked, devil-may-care.

The only thing bigger than them was their reputation. Sadistic to the extreme…

I’d had my eye on them since I’d become a member earlier this year, and I’d had friends tell me I should approach them. Until I found out that they were just sheep in wolves’ clothing and abided by every safety rule imaginable—something Isela was refuting. She’d told me that was nonsense; she claimed they played by their own rules when no one was looking.